Gabriele,
> I have been given a dual PIII with 768MB RAM and I am going to install
> PostgreSQL on it, for data warehousing reasons. I have also been given four
> 160 Ultra SCSI disks (36MB each) with a RAID controller (Adaptec 2100). I
> am going to use a RAID5 architecture (this gives me approximately 103 GB of
> data) and install a Debian Linux on it: this machine will be dedicated
> exclusively to PostgreSQL.
FWIW, RAID5 with < 5 disks is probably the worst-performing disk setup for PG
with most kinds of DB applications. However, with 4 disks you don't have a
lot of other geometries available. If the database will fit on one disk, I
might suggest doing RAID 1 for 2 of the disks, and having two single disks,
one with the OS and swap, and one with the database log.
If you're doing Debian, make sure to get a current version of PG from Debian
Unstable.
> I was wondering which file system you suggest me: ext3 or reiserfs?
These seem to be equivalent in data=writeback mode for most database
applications. Use whichever you find easier to install & maintain.
> Also, I was thinking of using the 2.6.x kernel which offers a faster thread
> support: will PostgreSQL gain anything from it or should I stick with
> 2.4.x?
PostgreSQL won't gain anything from the thread support (unless you're using a
threaded front-end app with thread-safe ecpg). But it will gain from
several other improvements in 2.6, especially better scheduling and VM
support. Use 2.6.
--
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco