Re: PostgreSQL on Linux and Solaris comparison

On 7 Nov 2002, Neil Conway wrote:

> "scott.marlowe" <scott.marlowe@ihs.com> writes:
> > Agreed, but the performance issue on Solaris versus Linux for postgresql
> > seems to be more than just process startup time.  It's like almost
> > everything is about 50% to 100% faster in Linux than on sparc than in
> > Solaris on Sparc as regards postgresql (I tested 7.2.x last time, haven't
> > played with 7.3 on linux / sparc).
> >
> > Note that this same performance issue seems to rear its head with things
> > like apache 1.3.x, and samba.
>
> Perhaps someone that is using Solaris w/ PostgreSQL and is actually
> experiencing this degraded performance can provide some empirical
> data? For instance, profile an operation on Solaris, compare it with a
> similar profile on Linux/BSD/etc., and try to figure out where the
> performance hit is coming from. It may or may not be something that we
> can improve on...
>
> > It might be something to do with better shared memory performance or disk
> > access is faster, or a conglomeration of things.
>
> Well, we use Intimate Shared Memory (ISM) on Solaris in 7.3 -- that
> should at least be a slight performance improvement over shm on other
> platforms, as ISM uses huge TLB pages.

sounds like it's time to req one of our semi-retired SPARC boxen then...

:-)