* Bill (bill@math.uchicago.edu) wrote:
> I currently have a mysql server running with a database of around 800
> gb. The problem is that the server is old (500 MHz Pentium III with 512
> MB RAM) and I want to change this to a new server and convert the
> existing database to Postgresql on Debian (I assume that Postgresql
> offers better performance for complex read only queries on large
> databases), though I was wondering if
Excellent plan. If you're looking at using Debian stable I'd encourage
you to consider using the PostgreSQL back-port of 7.4.2 to Debian stable
on backports.org.
> 1. It is possible to have some sort of load-balancing through buying
> many computers without replication, i.e have one server which has the
> databases and then other servers which has no database but just exists
> to balance the memory and processor load? (I have heard this is possible
> with C-JDBC)It is difficult to have enough space to replicate a 600 gb
> database across all computers)
I don't think so... There's something called OpenMosix which does this
on independent processes but not for threaded programs (since it doesn't
make sense to split them across different nodes if they're accessing the
same memory- every memory access would have to be checked) like the
PostgreSQL server.
> 2. It is advantageous to buy AMD 64 rather than the Pentium IV?
Personally, I certainly think so. More registers, more memory possible
inside one application, other stuff...
Stephen