Jack Orenstein <jorenstein@archivas.com> writes:
> Is this expected behavior? Is there something I need to tune to avoid
> this problem? I've left postgresql.conf alone, except for sort_mem (8
> meg).
The default shared_buffers in pre-7.4 releases is too small for any but
tiny databases. Try putting it up to 1000 or more buffers.
regards, tom lane