clp@beartrk.UUCP (Charlie Pilzer) (10/18/88)
I have a client who is using a 3B2/310 for a relatively small (<10000 records) database. There are some users who are complaining that the machine is too slow and would like to enhance the performance. But they would like to do it inexpensively if possible. The current configuration is: 3B2/310, 2 Meg Memory, 72 MB disk, 2 Ports cards, XM box with 23 MB tape drive. Software is Sys V, rel 2.1. I've talked with some other users who suggested that A) more memory might help, B) a second disk might help, C) changing to Sys V, rel 3 might help. I'm open to any suggestions, but in particular I'm curious about the following: 1) The big culprit right now seems to be the disk. I was thinking that if I added a second disk and dedicated it to the database could I get more performance. What disks seem to give good performance? Would it make a lot of difference? 2) Adding more memory can be expensive, because to go to 4 MB (the max) I wind up with two 1 MB memory cards and no place to put them. Also the price of the memory quoted to me was relatively high. Would adding memory make a significant performance change? Where can I get less expensive memory boards? 3) Some of the software in use now is available in object only and as far as I know has not been ported to Sys V, ver 3 yet. Can I take code that runs under version 2 and just run it under version3? Is version 3 faster than version 2? I did notice that changing from 2.0 (swapped) to 2.1 (paged) was a noticable improvement. Charlie Pilzer Bear Track Computer Co. netsys!beartrk!clp 301-588-0326
abell@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (abell) (10/20/88)
I hate to tell you this, but we have tried everything which you thought of and came up with a machine with twice the disk capacity, twice the RAM capacity and System V rel 3 to boot, but the machine was not any better, or at least not for our needs, than it was prior to the upgrade. We were doing essentially the same thing you were. We were teaching a course on Data Base Management using ACCELL from UNIFY. I'm afraid that you're only hope would be to upgrade to a faster machine as we found that it is the CPU which is the bottle neck. You can verify this yourself by running the System Activity reports (sar). It will help you determine what your bottle neck is. I believe it is documented in the System Administration Utilities manual. Good Luck! ------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Alan Bell | For smart mailers (e.g. internet): | | Cal Poly State Univ. | abell@polyslo.calpoly.edu | | San Luis Obispo, CA 93407 | For dumb mailers: | | (805) 756-7185 | ...ucbvax!voder!polyslo!abell | -------------------------------------------------------------------------
jkj737@uxf.cso.uiuc.edu (10/20/88)
/* Written 9:54 pm Oct 17, 1988 by clp@beartrk.UUCP in uxf.cso.uiuc.edu:comp.sys.att */
/* ---------- "Making 3B2/310 faster" ---------- */
I have a client who is using a 3B2/310 for a relatively small (<10000 records)
database. There are some users who are complaining that the machine is too
slow and would like to enhance the performance. But they would like to do it
inexpensively if possible.
The current configuration is: 3B2/310, 2 Meg Memory, 72 MB disk, 2 Ports cards,
XM box with 23 MB tape drive. Software is Sys V, rel 2.1.
I've talked with some other users who suggested that A) more memory might help,
B) a second disk might help, C) changing to Sys V, rel 3 might help.
I'm open to any suggestions, but in particular I'm curious about the following:
/* End of text from uxf.cso.uiuc.edu:comp.sys.att */
The first thing I would do is set up the performance utilities that come with
Unix (sar(1m) and the like) and take a weeks worth of data under normal
load.
Take a look at disk activity, and memory swapping stats to see where
the bottleneck is.
If you have a LOT of disk activity and very little memory swapping, you
probably need a second disk to offload some of the work. Unix works best
with swap and / on one disk /usr on second. This minimizes head movement
and reduces the amount of time waiting for i/o (wio). It balances the disk
use more evenly between both drives.
If you have a LOT of memory swapping, you don't have enough memory so Unix is
constantly swapping memory out to disk which will hurt if you also are
doing a lot of disk activity as well. You probably should look at getting
more memory.
You should also look at performance verses number of users. The 310's
ports cards are dumb (almost) and cause more overhead than the new eports
we use on the 600. You could have too many users for a 310.
Release 3.1 does have nice features like demand paging and shared
libraries, but these come at a price. The overhead is slightly higher, so
depending of machine use it may or may not help. I have found that our 300
running 3.1 is a total dog. A 310 should fair a little better.
As my computer architecture professor said, "The only way to may a good
decision is to not make a stupid one." (ie. don't change ANYTHING until
you look are the system activity reports for the normal system load and
verify the bottlenecks.) Be sure to use all the options of SAR(1M) available.
#include<disclaimer.h>
Jeff Johnson
Global Information Systems Technology, Inc.
1800 Woodfield Drive
Savoy, IL 61874
UUCP: ...!uiucuxc!gistqa!jjohnson
ARPANET: jjohnson%gistqa@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu
-or-
jkj737%uxf@uxc.cso.uiuc.edulen@netsys.COM (Len Rose) (10/20/88)
I can't believe you would say this.. With a maxed out configuration the machine is very nice under a load.. You neglected to mention how many users you were trying to support. If it was greater than 6, running some sort of heavy duty application then you shouldn't have been using a 310 anyway. Tuning also can make quite a bit of difference. I am curious to find out how many users you had on the machine..
paddock@mybest6.UUCP (Steve Paddock) (10/21/88)
In article <260@beartrk.UUCP> clp@beartrk.UUCP (Charlie Pilzer) writes: >I have a client who is using a 3B2/310 for a relatively small (<10000 records) >database. There are some users who are complaining that the machine is too >slow and would like to enhance the performance. But they would like to do it >inexpensively if possible. I'd consider: 1. Running sar to verify that the disk is the bottleneck. If it is, try adding memory and devoting more than default memory to disk buffers. Overall, I've found that a 14mhz 4meg 310 is a vast improvement over stock; even at stock 10mhz, NBUF = 1100 in /etc/master.d/kernel does very good things for disk intensive operations with 4mb RAM. Also consider that you can upgrade to 3MB to mitigate cost. Another tool (in 3.n, at least) for checking on memory/swap activity is swap -l. 2. Lowering priority of background jobs and uucp jobs by writing "nice -20 xxx" wrappers for uuxqt and uusched and by lowering priority of lpsched in /etc/rc.d/lp. 3. Use the undocumented feature of putting pri=n as the first thing in the gcos field of /etc/passwd. This causes the user to start with an elevated or reduced nice value (see ps -el output to verify both 2. and 3.) I nice nuucp down to 39 with no problems and significant performance improvements. By the same token, enhance the priority of the complaining users. 4. Consider increasing the clock speed to 14mhz. Some folks have had terrible luck with this - unexplained disk errors and surprises, others have had success. The ambient temperature is a critical factor even when the motherboard is qualified for this upgrade. 5. Using sar again, be sure that the kernel is as small as possible where you don't need the configuration. 6. I haven't seen that two drives makes a real difference in performance; nor have I seen a correlation between the placement of /usr on the second drive and improved performance, manual notwithstanding. 7. Do consider backing up the partitions to tape, and either using mkfs to rebuild an orderly file system or doing rm * followed by fsck -s to rebuild the free list. There is a command in /etc, compress, I believe, which will automate some of this for you. Disclaimer: I work for AT&T, however these are my opinions. I'm sure we disagree on many things, but I am fond of the 310, and was before I was hired. Steve -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Steve Paddock uunet!bigtex!mybest!paddock ut-emx!mybest!paddock {attmail|gbsic5|bscaus}!uhous1!paddock
dwc@homxc.UUCP (Malaclypse the Elder) (10/22/88)
well, if you are cpu bound, then you are sunk. but if you are disk bound, then getting more memory may help...provided that you also increase the amount of memory dedicated to system buffers. this may or may not help depending on the nature of your database accesses. a previous poster suggested sar(1). this is really useful in determining what your bottlenecks truly are. i would do a serious look before making a guess as to what you need to do/get/etc. danny chen att!homxc!dwc
adh@anumb.UUCP (a.d.hay) (10/22/88)
In article <2838@mybest6.UUCP> paddock@mybest6.UUCP (Steve Paddock) writes:
[]
--> Overall, I've found that a 14mhz 4meg 310 is a vast improvement
-->over stock; even at stock 10mhz, NBUF = 1100 in /etc/master.d/kernel does
-->very good things for disk intensive operations with 4mb RAM.
[]
-->4. Consider increasing the clock speed to 14mhz. Some folks have had terrible
-->luck with this - unexplained disk errors and surprises, others have had
-->success. The ambient temperature is a critical factor even when the
-->motherboard is qualified for this upgrade.
somewhere, i saw that at&t has a 22Mhz (;^>) motherboard swap for 310s & 400s.
unfortunately, i can't remember where...
--
Andrew Hay +------------------------------------------------------+
Holistic Specialist | I was reading my name on the glass of my office door |
AT&T-BL Ward Hill MA | and listening to the staccato of rain on my desktop- |
mvuxq.att.com!adh +------------------------------------------------------+hjespersen@trillium.waterloo.edu (Hans Jespersen) (10/24/88)
In article <373@anumb.UUCP> adh@anumb.UUCP (a.d.hay) writes: > >somewhere, i saw that at&t has a 22Mhz (;^>) motherboard swap for 310s & 400s. >unfortunately, i can't remember where... > The 22MHz upgrade is for the 500s and 600s. Basically the standard motherboard is swaped for a 700 motherboard. The clock speed goes to 22 MHz and you get the entire WE32200 chip set (including 32206 MAU). I believe this upgrade will not work with 310s and 400s because they use different memory cards ( without ECC like the 500, 600, and 700). The upgrade package include a new facepate with the designation 3B2/522 or 622 accordingly. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Hans Jespersen UUCP : attcan!{uunet|utgpu}!watmath!trillium!hjespersen University of Waterloo INTERNET: hjespersen@trillium.waterloo.edu (on loan from AT&T) VOICENET: (519)747-1721 Waterloo, Ontario MAILNET : 20 Dunbar St. N, Waterloo, Ont., N2L 2C7 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
len@netsys.COM (Len Rose) (10/24/88)
I think it's time for a migration kit from 3B2/400's to 3B2/500 or something of that order? AT&T are you listening? Len Len Rose - Netsys,Inc. len@ames.arc.nasa.gov or len@netsys.com
rjd@occrsh.ATT.COM (Randy_Davis) (10/24/88)
In article <9267@watdragon.waterloo.edu> hjespersen@trillium.waterloo.edu (Hans Jespersen) writes: :In article <373@anumb.UUCP> adh@anumb.UUCP (a.d.hay) writes: :> :>somewhere, i saw that at&t has a 22Mhz (;^>) motherboard swap for 310s & 400s. :>unfortunately, i can't remember where... :> :The 22MHz upgrade is for the 500s and 600s. Basically the standard motherboard :is swaped for a 700 motherboard. The clock speed goes to 22 MHz and you :get the entire WE32200 chip set (including 32206 MAU). I believe this upgrade :will not work with 310s and 400s because they use different memory cards ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ :( without ECC like the 500, 600, and 700). The upgrade package include a new :facepate with the designation 3B2/522 or 622 accordingly. Yes, also the model 310 and 400 use a motherboard designated as the ED4C637, while the modle 500 and 600 use a 518A and the 700 uses a 518B. The ED4C637 is a whole different internal architecure than the 518A or 518B, and is a little smaller than the 518A or 518B, which makes a motherboard swap an impossibility due to physical limitations (without swapping out almost all the internal components). The 518A and 518B are very similar and use the same internal architecture. Randy Davis UUCP: ...(att!)ocrjd!randy ...(att!)occrsh!rjd
rjd@occrsh.ATT.COM (Randy_Davis) (10/24/88)
In article <10774@netsys.COM> len@netsys.COM (Len Rose) writes: > > I think it's time for a migration kit from 3B2/400's to 3B2/500 or > something of that order? [rest deleted - rjd] > > Len An upgrade from a model 400 to a model 500 would require the replacement of the motherboard (ED4C637 to 518A or 518B), power supply (different connectors, higher power capacity, different power on/power off circuits), hard disk (ST506 to ESDI), apparatus mounting (what the backplane is mounted to), memory cards (191B, 191D, 192B, etc. to 523A, 523B, etc.), the SCSI Bridge controller (the 400 doesn't have it), and assorted hardware such as the disk mounting brackets, etc. In other words, almost everything. In fact, the only common parts to the two units are the floppy drive, the outer chassis, the battery, assorted small hardware parts, and any option cards starting with 195-. Nice upgrade.... Be easier and probably cheaper to just buy the 500 and sell the 400. Randy Davis UUCP: ...(att!)ocrjd!randy ...(att!)occrsh!rjd
len@netsys.COM (Len Rose) (10/25/88)
That would be one hell of an upgrade,eh? I was just thinking out loud I suppose.. Where can I trade in my 14 mhz 3B2/400? I want more mips! Len