Oracle Exadata vs. Oracle SPARC Servers

Oracle Exadata is well-suited for environments where massive performance for Oracle databases is required. Storage indexes reduce the unnecessary I/O. Smart Flash
Cache accelerates random reads/writes.

Our OLTP application demands very high concurrency. Multi-node Exadata provides high availability and zero downtime during DB patching. It comes with lots of built-in automations, so it reduces many routine tasks for sysadmins, like network, storage, and VM configuration, and it also reduces many Oracle DBA tasks, like Oracle software installation, patching, and upgrades.

Incentivized

Excellent to consolidate workload using the LDom Virtualization (which is included free of charge). Good integration into Oracle Support with Automated Service Requests (ASR). Easy to migrate workloads from older servers to newer generations, such as SPARC S7 or T8. After migrating workloads from older SPARC T4 to S7, applications are approximately 2x faster.

• Oracle Database : Deliver industry-leading security, high availability and scalability with Oracle Database, which has been significantly enhanced to take advantage of the Oracle Exadata Storage Servers.
• Exadata Smart Scan : Improve query performance by offloading intensive query processing and data mining scoring to scalable intelligent storage servers.
• Smart Flash Cache : Transparently cache 'hot' read and write data to fast solid-state storage, improving query response times and throughput. Exadata systems use the latest PCI flash technology rather than flash disks. PCI flash delivers ultra-high performance by placing flash directly on the high speed PCI bus rather than behind slow disk controllers.
• Hybrid Columnar Compression : Reduce the size of data warehousing tables by 10x, and archive tables by 50x, to improve performance and lower storage costs for primary, standby, and backup databases. Query high, query low, archive high and archive low.
• Infiniband Network : Connect multiple Oracle Exadata Database Machines using the InfiniBand fabric to form a larger single system image configuration. Each InfiniBand link provides 40 Gigabits of bandwidth–many times higher than traditional storage or server networks.
• Petabyte Scalability : Easily scale data warehouse to support enterprise data growth.

Incentivized

• encryption
• masking
• redaction
• subsetting

Incentivized

• The process of patching and upgrade of Exadata server components could be improved with a goal to minimize the overall effort, make it fully automated and transparent.
• Improved guidelines and possibly more sophisticated tools for sizing of new Exadata servers for migration from old legacy hardware.

Incentivized

• We didn't have any problems whatsoever with integration

Incentivized

I am comparing Exadata with the Oracle RAC database experience. In addition to Oracle RAC features, Exadata provides automatic performance optimization through Smart Scan and storage indexes. Deep integration with the Oracle ecosystem and tight coupling with Oracle Enterprise Manager
for monitoring and management. Some downsides of Exadata are: a steep learning curve, concepts like cell offloading, IORM, and flash cache behavior aren’t intuitive initially. Operating
Exadata requires specialized DBA skills.

Incentivized

Extreme long lifetime (10+ years). High performance. SPARC S7 CPU has 4.2GhZ and SPARC T8 has 5GhZ. Virtualization is included for free. Very easy to use because it runs Oracle Solaris. The SPARC Servers scale very well. Oracle SPARC Servers have positively impacted our organization by improving our budget, as we can use the system for many years without having to purchase new systems.

No unplanned downtime over many years.

Very high CPU speed with 4-5 GhZ

Support requests are opened automatically.

Component replacements are very fast.

Oracle Exadata Database Machine had the best performance overall hands down. It clearly beat the competition and we were seeing 1000X improvement on SAP HANA. Oracle Exadata Database Machine beat that without us refactoring our code. To achieve that in HANA, we had to refactor the code somewhat. Now this was for our limited POC of 5 use cases. Given the large number of stored procedures we had in Sybase, we need to capture more production metrics but we are seeing incredible performance.

Incentivized

In terms of the Power ecosystem, the use cases of IBM Power System S914 is very limited. Resources required for properly working PowerVM and VIOS are very difficult. In Oracle SPARC Servers setup, it is pretty easy with very limited steps to be performed. This helped our Return of Investment become positive very quickly.

Incentivized

The servers scale very well with lots of CPU cores.

• Single support from a single vendor with both machine and database from Oracle, which is costing us less.
• With Exadata, we need less technical manpower and less technical support. A business transaction with the integrated and centralized database helps us focus on other business needs.
• We don't need to buy additional licenses and Hardware for the next 3 to 5 years.

Incentivized

• Does Not Support Domain Migration
• Migration Fails When the Target Machine Has Insufficient Free LDCs
• Limit the Maximum Number of Virtual Functions That Can Be Assigned to a Domain

Incentivized