Originally posted by jabl
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If the creator of Ext4 did not until now, have access to such big systems, do you expect Ext4 to handle the workload well on many cores? Why is he starting scalability work on as many as 32 cores?
Ergo, most Linux developers are using desktops. Linux was a Desktop OS, growing into Servers. Just like Windows, it was a desktop OS, trying to conquer serverOS too. Windows have not succeeded yet. Linux fares better though, as Linux is superior to Windows.
And, as we know, desktops dont have massive amounts of cpu or disks. I find it compelling that Linux kernel devs today, say that 32 core systems are big, and they never had access to such big SMP systems. My point is, Linux are not made for big SMP servers as explained by Ted Tso.
What has this to do with Solaris updated graphic stack -> Solaris does not scale? Quite strange reasoning?
And? Does that imply that General Motors should switch to producing cocaine, since that has a much higher margin than making cars?
People here say Linux scales best in the world, it scales on HPC, it scales on SMP. If Linux chooses to go after SMP servers, that is no big deal. SMP servers are the same as HPC servers, people say. No big difference. Why dont Linux go after HPC and SMP? No, Linux let the big bucks SMP market be. Why? Because "it is vulnerable". Doesnt this explanation sound a bit... strange? They dont want to be millionaries, because... the market is vulnerable. Well, Oracle thrives in that market and that market shows no sign of vulnerability. IBM are there too. HP too. etc etc. Only Linux "chooses" to not go there. Of free will. Strange?
IBM/HP/Oracle are not as eager to push Linux performance for DB workloads on large NUMA systems, because they want to protect their own high-margin/low-volume business as long as possible.
-Hey boss, I see only expensive IBM/HP/Oralce on the SMP market, and they charge gazillions of USD for a single server with a Database. We should do that too, we can sell a SGI Altix server with 1000s of cores for a fraction of the price. We will sell many many servers. Everyone will evaluate our 50x faster server, for a much cheaper price and then start to buy! Let us slap on Linux on a SGI Altix system with 1000s of cores!
-No, I dont want to earn money. That high end market has made Oracle/HP/IBM a fortune and employs 100.000s of persons at theses companies, they are vulnerable. They might go bankrupt any time. IBM is the oldest IT company, 100 years old, and it might go bankrupt anytime. Oracle has billions in cash, in his war chest, and they might loose that money anytime.
-Say again?
-Yes, it is true. Sun lost all high margin contracts, and was forced to do low margin business which seems much better. Let us do low margin business, just like Sun instead. It is better for us.
Because the volume more than makes up for the lack of margins.
And HP's CEO Apotheker wanted to sell off the PC division recently, why? It had 4 billion in revenue, and the volume was huge, HP was the greatest PC seller. Answer: Apotheker said the margins were too low.
High volume, low margin is not good business.
Because market entry is difficult and expensive for various reasons, and while the margins may be high the volumes are quite low so it's questionable if there's any profit left after deducting R&D expenses. Technically, both Linux/x86 and proprietary Unixes get the job done, in most cases about equally well
I believe [Linux companies] have analyzed the situation and come to the conclusion that there's not that much profit to be made in that [high end] market.
Windows is seld on big SMP systems, the HP Superdome Itanium cpus, but no one used Windows on that server. MS have now stopped development of Windows for Itanium cpus, because HP did not sell enough Superdome SMP systems with Windows on it.
No, I don't think there will be any sudden change (vendor lock-in being a big factor, for one). I believe that the Linux, Windows, and x86-64 will slowly but surely continue to eat the high end market from below, as they have done for the past 20 years. The economics are just too compelling to ignore.
Of course Linux and Windows will continue to eat into the high end market from below. And if Linux / Windows could eat into it from above, they would do that as well. But they cant. Windows can not. Linux can not.
Beyond SGI, or why do you bring this up? As I'm sure we all know, most Linux companies are software companies. They don't make HW, duh. And of course, a large part of the argument for using Linux servers in the first place, is to be able to pick cheap of the shelf x86 hardware, rather than whatever overpriced stuff you need to run some proprietary Unix.
To be honest, spending 35 million for a single 64 CPU machine sounds moronic. Perhaps the CIO is golf buddies with some vendor representative?
Why do companies shell out millions of USD for a single big SMP server? Is it because they like it? Are they dumb? If Linux can do all that, but 50x faster, for a fraction of the price, why dont everyone migrate to Oracle Linux and Oracle Database instead? It is easy to do.
We have two explanations why companies dont buy big Linux SMP servers. Which one is more reasonable?
1) Linux can handle everything, both SMP and HPC. The reason Linux does not snatch the high end lucrative market worth billions, is because it is is not profitable, it is vulnerable. But Linux could take that market, if Linux companies wanted to. But they dont want that. They have better things to do, than to become millionaires. No Linux company does want to become the next IBM or Oracle or HP or Google or Apple. They dont want that. Why? (I dont know, ask the Linux supporters here).
2) Linux and Windows dearly wants to go into the high end lucrative market, but Linux and Windows does not cut it. That is the reason no one makes big SMP Linux servers. Even if you recompile Linux on an existing big 64 cpu SMP server such as HP Unix Superdome, the biggest Linux configuration is for 8 cpus (16 cpus if you make a cluster of two 8-cpu nPars)
Which explanation is more reasonable you think?
After spending umpteen billions on a more or less bankrupt Sun, I'm not sure Ellison is the most objective observer we can find..
A high-margin/low volume market can be profitable, but the incumbent(s) are also very vulnerable to entrants with a high-volume/low margin business model. Especially so in computing where R&D costs dominate and the unit cost is very low (or more or less zero for software).
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