Re: PostgreSQL and AMD?

On Sun, 15 Jun 2008, John Tregea wrote:

> The machines would be running Windows XP Pro (our clients requirement).
> Can anyone tell me if PostgreSQL runs fine on the AMD platform and
> specifically does anyone have experience with the AMD Phenom Quad
> Core Processors 9600B.

Once you've settled on Windows as your PostgreSQL platform, you've kind of
given up on prioritizing performance at that point--there's a couple of
issues that limit how good that can possibly be no matter what hardware
you throw at it. Details like which processor you're using are pretty
trivial in comparision. Also, the real questions you should be asking are
ones like "did I get a good disk controller for database use?" which is a
really serious concern in this space. My guess is you're talking about an
HP DC5850. I am rather skeptical of the disk subsystem in that system (at
most two disks and just a crappy BIOS RAID) working well in a database
context. It's probably fine for a non-critical system, but I wouldn't run
a business on it.

In general, AMD has been lagging just a bit behind Intel's products
recently on systems with a small number of sockets. There are occasional
reports where multi-socket multi-core systems from AMD are claimed to do
better than similar Intel systems due to AMD's better bus design, I
haven't seen that big difference either way myself in recent products.

I've been using several different types of Opteron and X2 processors
systems from AMD the last couple of years and typically they work just
fine. But Phenom has really been a troubled platform launch for AMD and I
think that's why nobody has offered any suggestions to you yet--I haven't
heard any reports from people using that chip in a server environment yet.

--
* Greg Smith gsmith(at)gregsmith(dot)com http://www.gregsmith.com Baltimore, MD