I have had several conversations with our technical team on the issue of how applications performance scales within multi-processor servers. The bottom line is that IF the vendor who wrote the code that you are running on the MP server went out of their way to take explicit advantage of MP support in the OS, AND they carefully tweaked the application so as to not do things that work well in single processor environments but do not work well in MP environments, then the application (in your case, the database) should scale well across the multiple processors in the server. However, the vast majority of server software that claims to be built for MP environments is simply "thread safe" and does nothing to prevent misuse of the multiple processors. It will be very hard for you to get a straight answer from your software vendor since if you ask you are going to get some sort of indignant technical marketing reply like, "Our software takes full advantage of the MP support in Windows 2000". So, the only way to find out is to try it. Unfortunately, that means getting your hands on the actual servers, and writing scripts to create load in the same manner as real users would. Cheers, Bernd Harzog CEO KevSoft Corporation 678-455-5509 x701 bernd@xxxxxxxxxxx -----Original Message----- From: thin-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:thin-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Eugene Herman Sent: Thursday, October 10, 2002 11:14 AM To: thin@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: [THIN] Performance Issues - Off Topic We are currently in a rather heated argument with one of our vendors as = well as one of our colleagues on the left coast about performance of Multi = processor servers. The application is a very large Pervasive Database - that may be accessed = by as many as 800 users - A fair number through Citrix. But the issue is = not Citrix. Left Coast purchased a Proliant DL760 with 4 Pentium III 900 MHz Processors= ( presumably they could add 4 more) They are running this on a Windows = 2000 platform. The vendor is "suggesting" we look at a ML570 with quad 1.4 Ghz Xeon = processors. We are looking at ML530 with dual 2.4 Ghz processors which is almost = $22000 cheaper.=20 Our current enviromnent is Novell which handles 2 processorss well but we = are not sure that it wil handle 4 so we are looking to convert to Win2k Questions- if we compare the Dual 2.4 Xeon ML530 to the Quad DL760 with = 900 MHz processors - is there really more horsepower or does overhead wipe = out any advantage of the quad processor. If we look at the Quad DL560 with 1.6 Gb processors - are we again going = to see the benefit of 4 medium speed processors vs 2 very fast ones. We are also guessing that the ML 570 and DL560 will be upgraded soon to at = least a 2.2gb processor or maybe even a 2.4gb processor this year - at = lord knows what price. The basic question is - are there metrics to benchmark 2 vs 4 processor = systems ************************************************************************* This message, together with any attachments, is intended only for the use of the individual or entity to which it is addressed. It may contain information that is confidential and prohibited from disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination or copying of this message or any attachment is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please notify the original sender immediately by telephone or by return e-mail and delete this message along with any attachments, from your computer. Thank you. ************************************************************************* ********************************************** This weeks sponsor 99Point9.com 99Point9 helps solve your unresolved technical server-based questions, issues and incidents. http://www.99point9.com *********************************************** For Archives, to Unsubscribe, Subscribe or set Digest or Vacation mode use the below link. http://thethin.net/citrixlist.cfm ********************************************** This weeks sponsor 99Point9.com 99Point9 helps solve your unresolved technical server-based questions, issues and incidents. http://www.99point9.com *********************************************** For Archives, to Unsubscribe, Subscribe or set Digest or Vacation mode use the below link. http://thethin.net/citrixlist.cfm