Re: Re: htsearch very slow on Mac Mini - why?

On Wed, 13 Jul 2005, David Bourne wrote:
> Why use Linux? htdig runs well on the Mac 'unix'. How much ram do you have? A 
> default 256 MByte may be a problem. A search on my site with htdig 3.1.6 on 
> an old G4 with ram about 500 MByte, probably about 500 MHz took about 2 sec. 
> Are you running much else on the machine?

  I honestly wouldn't recommend using MacOS X as a server for anyone except 
die-hard Mac users who are afraid of command line. Linux and real BSD's 
(running monolithic kernels as opposed to Apple's Mach) knock the socks of 
MacOS X when it comes to performance.

  Here are some quotes from a review at AnandTech. The article in general 
is somewhat a waste because he compares MacOS X on PPC to Linux on 
Intel/AMD (instead of a more logical comparison like MacOS vs Linux on PPC 
or MacOS on PPC vs BSD on Intel). However some of the points are 
interesting, and I can tell you from direct experience, I've generally 
gotten *way* better performance running Linux on my G4s than MacOS X.


http://www.anandtech.com/mac/showdoc.aspx?i=2436&p=8

"Mac OS X is incredibly slow, between 2 and 5(!) times slower, in creating 
new threads, as it doesn't use kernel threads, and has to go through extra 
layers (wrappers). No need to continue our search: the G5 might not be the 
fastest integer CPU on earth - its database performance is completely 
crippled by an asthmatic operating system that needs up to 5 times more 
time to handle and create threads."


http://www.anandtech.com/mac/showdoc.aspx?i=2436&p=9

"The server performance of the Apple platform is, however, catastrophic. 
When we asked Apple for a reaction, they told us that some database 
vendors, Sybase and Oracle, have found a way around the threading 
problems. We'll try Sybase later, but frankly, we are very sceptical. The 
whole "multi-threaded Mach microkernel trapped inside a monolithic FreeBSD 
cocoon with several threading wrappers and coarse-grained threading access 
to the kernel", with a "backwards compatibility" millstone around its neck 
sounds like a bad fusion recipe for performance. "


Cheers,

Chris


-------------------------------------------------------
SF.Net email is sponsored by: Discover Easy Linux Migration Strategies
from IBM. Find simple to follow Roadmaps, straightforward articles,
informative Webcasts and more! Get everything you need to get up to
speed, fast. http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=7477&alloc_id=16492&op=click
_______________________________________________
ht://Dig general mailing list: <[email protected]>
ht://Dig FAQ: http://htdig.sourceforge.net/FAQ.html
List information (subscribe/unsubscribe, etc.)
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/htdig-general