Thread: Server Requirements

Hi,

If we have clients that are going to buy new computers or upgrade
current ones, what we can recommend to them for optimal system
performance to run Postgres. These can be servers or desktop PCs. We
can have from 1-10 users in at a time. At this point all of our
database's are small but that can change of course.

Christine Penner
Ingenious Software
250-352-9495
christine@ingenioussoftware.com

On 17/12/2009 7:21 AM, Christine Penner wrote:
> Hi,
>
> If we have clients that are going to buy new computers or upgrade
> current ones, what we can recommend to them for optimal system
> performance to run Postgres. These can be servers or desktop PCs. We can
> have from 1-10 users in at a time. At this point all of our database's
> are small but that can change of course.

I think the traditional answer to a question like that is "how long is a
piece of string?"

General guides for PostgreSQL setups are:

   - Use a good quality battery backed RAID controller with disks in
     RAID 10 for performance. Cheaper systems can use a standalone
     disk, non-BBU raid controller, or software RAID 1, but **MUST**
     not have any write caching enabled or you *WILL* lose data.

   - More memory is better. Memory is cheap, so get lots.

   - For lots of concurrent queries, fast disks, more RAM and more CPU
     cores are more important than a fast CPU. For single complex
     queries a fast CPU (with fewer cores) may be important.

Make sure to tune your PostgreSQL install, too.

See the main documentation and wiki.postgresql.org for lots more advice
and information.

--
Craig Ringer

Christine Penner wrote:
> Hi,
>
> If we have clients that are going to buy new computers or upgrade
> current ones, what we can recommend to them for optimal system
> performance to run Postgres. These can be servers or desktop PCs. We can
> have from 1-10 users in at a time. At this point all of our database's
> are small but that can change of course.

Hi Christine,

   The problem with this question is that it is far too vague to be able
to answer in any meaningful way. You need to add some information to
your request. Things like:

- Data set size; How many tables, how many columns, how fast will it
grow, what kind of data are in the columns?
- Performance; are you using triggers, functions, a lot of complex or
simple queries, lots of UPDATEs, INSERTs and DELETEs?
- Redundancy; How do you plan to backup the data? What performance
criteria do you have? What's your acceptable down time in the case of a
failure?
- Interface; Users is one thing, but how many transactions will these
users incur?
- Budget; How much is your client willing to invest? What about
long-term maintenance or support contracts?
- Environment; What operating system will postgres run on?

   Answer these questions and you will find the hardware requirements
will likely begin to become self-evident. If not, ask here again with
this info and we'll be much more able to help. :)

Madi

On Wed, Dec 16, 2009 at 4:21 PM, Christine Penner
<christine@ingenioussoftware.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> If we have clients that are going to buy new computers or upgrade current
> ones, what we can recommend to them for optimal system performance to run
> Postgres. These can be servers or desktop PCs. We can have from 1-10 users
> in at a time. At this point all of our database's are small but that can
> change of course.

Like Craig said, your description is pretty vague, so it's hard to say
what you need most to make your pgsql server run fast.

Generally, the order of things to do to make it fast are:  Add memory,
add hard drives, add battery backed caching RAID controllers, add more
CPU horsepower.

But it depends largely on your usage patterns.  So, what are you doing
with your db?

> Christine Penner <christine@ingenioussoftware.com> :
> If we have clients that are going to buy new computers or upgrade
> current ones, what we can recommend to them for optimal system
> performance to run Postgres.

Make them buy the biggest, run virtual machine that dont use all the
ressources on it, gradually add ressource to the virtual machine when
needed.

Notify them when you get close to the maximum of ressource used.

Setting up a virtual machine is very easy nowadays:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/KVM

--
       Architecte Informatique chez Blueline/Gulfsat:
    Administration Systeme, Recherche & Developpement
                +261 34 29 155 34 / +261 33 11 207 36