Re: Problem with query, server totally unresponsive - Mailing list pgsql-performance

From Jim C. Nasby
Subject Re: Problem with query, server totally unresponsive
Date
Msg-id 20060324102520.GS90527@pervasive.com
Whole thread Raw
In response to Problem with query, server totally unresponsive  (Bendik Rognlien Johansen <bendik.johansen@gmail.com>)
Responses Re: Problem with query, server totally unresponsive
List pgsql-performance
On Thu, Mar 23, 2006 at 01:12:08PM +0100, Bendik Rognlien Johansen wrote:
> Hello, I have a big problem with one of my databases. When i run my
> query, after a few minutes, the postmaster shows 99% mem i top, and
> the server becomes totally unresponsive.

You've got a bunch of sorts going on; could you be pushing the machine
into swapping?

> I get this message when I try to cancel the query:
>
> server closed the connection unexpectedly
>         This probably means the server terminated abnormally
>         before or while processing the request.
> The connection to the server was lost. Attempting reset: Failed.

Did you send a kill of some kind to the backend?

> The machine has 2x Intel dual core processors (3GHz) and 2 Gigs of ram.

Unless I missed some big news recently, no such CPU exists.
Hyperthreading is absolutely not the same as dual core, and many people
have found that it's best to disable hyperthreading on database servers.
--
Jim C. Nasby, Sr. Engineering Consultant      jnasby@pervasive.com
Pervasive Software      http://pervasive.com    work: 512-231-6117
vcard: http://jim.nasby.net/pervasive.vcf       cell: 512-569-9461

pgsql-performance by date:

Previous
From: "Jim C. Nasby"
Date:
Subject: Re: Indexes with descending date columns
Next
From: Alvaro Herrera
Date:
Subject: Re: WAL logging of SELECT ... INTO command