In Chapter 2 we discussed the architecture of the Oracle database, and in Chapter 6 we described how Oracle uses hardware resources. Although Oracle operates in the same way on many hardware platforms, different hardware architectures can ultimately determine the specific scalability, performance tuning, management, and reliability options available to you. Over the years, Oracle has developed new features to address specific platforms and, with Oracle Database 10g, continues this process with a commitment to grid computing. This chapter discusses the various hardware architectures to provide a basis for understanding how Oracle leverages each of these platforms.
This chapter explains the following hardware systems and how Oracle takes advantage of the features inherent in each of the platforms:
Uniprocessors
Symmetric Multiprocessing (SMP) systems
Clusters
Massively Parallel Processing (MPP) systems
Non-Uniform Memory Access (NUMA) systems
Grid computing
We'll also discuss the use of different disk technologies and how to choose the hardware system that's most appropriate for your purposes.