Mladen, Yes. The ASSM did the trick. Once I switch the tablespace to SPACE MANAGEMENT MANUAL, the performance is back to before. I really appreciate your help. Thanks very much. David > > > Are trying to insert LOB into an ASSM tablespace? ASSM makes things much > > > > more sparse, you need many more writes> for the same LOB.> > -- > > > > Mladen Gogala> Sr. Oracle DBA> Video Monitoring Systems> 1500 Broadway> > > > New York City, NY 10036> Phone: (212) 329-5201> Email: mgogala@xxxxxxxxxxx _________________________________________________________________ Play free games, earn tickets, get cool prizes! Join Live Search Club. http://club.live.com/home.aspx?icid=CLUB_wlmailtextlink