Re: Fast Inserts and Hardware Questions

> > * Since most of what I am doing is inserts I will assume that the disk
> > will be my bottleneck over anything else.  Is this correct?
>
> Yes.
>
> > * Will the 7.1 WAL save me, when it comes to insert times?
> > * I read something about disabling fsync() to speed up inserts.  How
> > much will this speed things up?  I would consider it as I COULD rebuild
> > lost data from my logs in the event of a system crash and one night a
> > year of panic on my part is worth saving $100,000 in drive arrays.
>
> Turning fsync off gave about a factor of 10 increase (!) before 7.1 - the
> WAL stuff means you can do so safely. Basically PG should rebuild itself
> from the WAL file in the event of system failure. Have to admit I've not
> tried it myself yet.

No.  You should get good performance in 7.1 without using -F.  Using -F
in 7.1 makes the system unreliable in case of an OS crash.

--
  Bruce Momjian                        |  http://candle.pha.pa.us
  pgman@candle.pha.pa.us               |  (610) 853-3000
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