Developer Forum

We currently run Oracle Applications 10.7, Oracle 8 db. We are
upgrading to Oracle Applications 11.5.10 with new hardware. We plan on
running Oracle db on Red Hat Linux. My problem is with the hardware
that our hardware vendor is recommending we purchase.

This is what I am hoping the people with real-life experience, with
opinions based in reality, can give me: a recommendation on what we
really need, not what our hardware vendor needs to sell.

I'll tell you all about our current environment in the hopes that
you'll tell me what you think we should end up with server-wise. Our
application and db live on an old Sun server, dual 366 processor box,
has 1GB of RAM and we're using maybe 45GB of disk space (20GB test db,
22GB production db). At most we have 50 concurrent sessions, and
figure we will add 5 sessions a year for the next 5 years.

Now, we're not looking to go cheap here. My problem is that our vendor
recommends an HP ProLiant (which is fine) dual 2.2 AMD processors, with
16GB of RAM and an EMC storage device that starts at 450GB. Do we
really need a 1000% increase in disk space and a 1600% increase in RAM?
In my opinion, by the time this company actually grows to the point of
needing this kind of performance, the infrastructure will be at the age
where we'll be talking about replacing it.

Thanks in advance to all of you willing to help with your suggestions.
Regards,
Brian

Brain, is the disk unit a low-end EMC? With 80G drives these days that
could be only 6 disks and a 6 disk unit may be about the smallest thing
the vendor offers.

It would appear your hardware will exceed the performance and storeage
requirements of the application. That should not be a problem if the
cost is low enough that it does not make economic sense to go with a
less capable system.

It is generally better to have more disk than needed rathter than too
little. Who knows what other application might come along over the
next couple years.

Also if that is a raw disk figure then the usuable disk may be 20 - 25%
less due to RAID-5 or 50% less if morrowing is going to be employed.

HTH -- Mark D Powell --

Mark,

Thanks for your post. It is indeed the low end EMC unit. I understand
that the "smallest" storage unit you could get from EMC would be 450GB,
even if you only need 200GB, because 6 80GB are what is used.

I wonder if anyone else is using something a little smaller. Maybe a 3
80GB drive unit, 240GB total, that I can throw 160GB drives into in a
couple of years.

Brian

I'd add that as you upgrade Oracle versions, you may need or want to
have multiple times your db size online. Between RMAN and flashback
capabilities, you can eat disk quick.

When you start using the dbadvisors, you may find that each time you
make something use more memory, the advisor tells you to use more. 16G
may be overkill, but not too much.

Newer versions of Oracle db are much easier on the hardware for various
reasons, but if you start adding things like the appserver that can
negate the savings.

But in the end, you can only determine empirically whether it can work
for you. Being able to throw so much hardware at it that you aren't
running into any bottlenecks is a good thing, way cheaper than manual
tuning labor, and there are enough tools with the db to deal with gross
problems. Just remember to start from scratch and change the things
you need to in the init.ora, don't just throw the O8 one in there -
follow the directions!

jg

If you want to save some money half the RAM and get a single dual
core. If your EMC box is 100K+, I'd look for alternatives... you can
buy fibre for under 30K.. You can buy SCSI RAID arrays cheaper.

Try searchstorage.com

-A
.......
We use Oracle 8.1.7.4 and 9.2.0.6/7 on Solaris 2.7 and RH4
remove NSPAM to email

Oracle Apps? Separating database from the apps machine and only looking
at the database machine?

Ask your vendor to explain the 16GB of RAM. And if the answer is 'to get
more of the database into memory' or any mumbling about 'buffer cache',
fire the vendor. I'd be real hesitant to go past 4GB RAM and generally see
little use for more than 1GB per CPU in a typical SMB environment.

Disk SHOULD be cheap these days. You can get 1/2TB (2x1/4TB SATA)
attached to a computer for under USD$250, so going real fancy should not
cost more than 50x that. What is the reasoning behind the EMC suggestion?

If you are looking at one machine to cover the database and the apps, then
16GB RAM is not unreasonable as you have a very seriously-weighted
Application Server to feed as well.


I'd very seriously look at Oracle hosting (Oracle On Demand) and get
totally out of this rat-race.

--
Hans Forbrich
Canada-wide Oracle training and consulting
mailto: Fuzzy.GreyBeard_at_gmail.com
*** Top posting relies guarantees I won't respond. ***

We have just finished almost exactly what you are going to do. We
spec'd two Linux boxes for 9i RAC database (App servers running on
another two different boxes). 16GB of RAM and 4 physical CPUs each
box.

Basically 16GB for us is a big waste, since our SGA is only about 4GB
with 98% data cache efficiency.

During DEV/QA migration and initial testing, however, CPU usage was
constantly over 90% on each box. So we went through the typical
performance routine, primarily on the application side. We also got
some good help from a Hotsos consultant.

Now we are in production. CPU usage is around 20% for each box.

the answer to your question is a huge "depends", primarily on how much
you are willing to tune the application. One badly tuned query that
needs thousands of executions in a day could make people think they
need more and better hardware.

Good luck
JH

OK, now we're getting somewhere.

Here's what I have gone back to the hardware vendor for a quote on.
Production server: HP DL385, dual 2.2 Opteron, 8GB RAM, (2) 73GB 15K
drives mirrored.
Test/QA server: same, except 4GB RAM, (2) 73GB 15K drives mirrored
Data storage: HP DS2120 storage box with (4) 73GB 15K drives for 200+GB
RAID5 storage.

My thinking is with all of this I can easily throw more RAM or disks
into this if needed, but with RAM at $1600/GB for PC3200 why not see
how it performs. I realize during the upgrade phase it may be
sluggish, but after all is said and done, our 55 concurrent sessions
and 50GB database should perform well.

Does this seem logical?

The EMC is the lowest end storage EMC sells and it's 450GB for $6000.
The logic? most commision for the vendor, maybe?

One server will do both the apps and the db. currently the jobs are
split between two servers.

Jinig,

Thanks for your response. Can you tell me this? how many concurrent
sessions approx do you have and how big is your db?

Brian

That's only 12x the price for same amount of 'consumer' low end storage.
Not bad <g>

You still should check with the vendor for reasons for the suggestion.
It's always best to have the vendor justify their recommendation - on
paper.


In which case, I'd consider 8GB is probably reasonable for now. Just
watch that you don't overallocate SGA size. For your user population, I'd
probably start with less than 1GB SGA.

--
Hans Forbrich
Canada-wide Oracle training and consulting
mailto: Fuzzy.GreyBeard_at_gmail.com
*** Top posting relies guarantees I won't respond. ***

500GB database, 300 users per node, which makes 600 in total.

500GB database, 300 sessions in each node = 600 total.

Brian,

Perhaps you might just leave the RAID config in the DS2120 as RAID 10?
(b a a r f)
What caused you to go with RAID 5 with 4 disks?
I could possibly see RAID 5 with 5 disks, but never with 4.
Please read up on aligning database block size with filesystem and RAID
stripe sizes.
(there is such a paper available from hotsos.com)

hth.

-bdbafh

thanks for your post. I typed RAID 5 but meant RAID 10 - someone
swapped the number keys around on my keyboard....

Nothing has been set up yet, I'm still searching for the best hardware
configuration.

Brian