Re: Hardware for Informix Ver 10

Ben Thompson wrote:
dhaya.snidhi@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
We are currently running our application in Informix Online 9.3 TC2
Version in a DELL 6600 Server using Windows 2000. We have deceided to
upgrade our Hardware.

Our software supplier has advised us to go with Informix DS Ver 10.x
using Windows 2003 Advanced Server. As we have to go in for a Intel
based hardware, I would like to know the following :-

1. What is the maximum RAM we could use Windows 2003. ( Intel 32bit
Platform)
2. How much RAM can Informix Online 10.x address. ( Is there a
limitation)

4Gb on Windows for which there is only a 32-bit release.

3. Can we go in for a Intel 64bit processor with Informix 10.x

Yes but on Windows it won't help you. You will still have to use 32-bit software.

As someone else has pointed out you may be better off considering Linux on AMD.

4. Do IBM provide a factory tuned Informix 10.x ver on a Intel 64bit
processor platform.
5. Also advise if there are any other hardware vendors who provide
Intel 64bit processor with Informix DS 10.x

I don't know of a vendor who will supply a system with IDS preinstalled. I am not sure this would be desirable in most cases as DBAs like to partition their own discs. IBM sell some good server kit based on Intel Xeon processors which I would recommend. HP also do some good equipment and do sell AMD Opteron processors that you may well prefer. You would need to install IDS and possibly the OS on the equipment yourself.

Ben.

Also, I forgot to point out, on Linux, when using 64-bit AMD, and using
FX-64 dual-core ( sub-Opteron ) use the very very very very very latest
latest last 2.6 kernel. Why?

There are clock-timing issues with the kernel and sub-Opteron dual-core
chips that have only recently been fixed, and you have to use "notsc" on the
boot command-line, at least with SuSE, and a few other options to make
this problem go away, even if you compile your own kernel. This was
observed on SuSE10 and it might be on possibly other distros, and what you
end up with is a wild combination of boot settings. This clock racing
was found on some of the kernels from even as late as December 2005. The
startup has even more settings but I'm not at my machine to pass them along.
If I get a chance I'll post them later this week.

It was basically making the time accelerate into the future 2x to 4x faster
than it should, thus poisoning the time on the machine. Running Windows on
the same machine, no problem, hmmmm... so it's a linux kernel bug for FX-64
dual-core. I don't know about Opteron, you will have to make sure before
it goes into production.

If you view the kernel.org log you will see they have cleaned up and
'fixed' a lot of this code. It affects more the sub-Opteron chips--and no,
I don't know about Opteron, but as always, contact your Opteron supplier
to make sure they have this buttoned up.

Incidentally, Linus posted in January that Linux just turned 15 years old
as of January 2006. whoo-hoo!

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