2.4 vs 2.6 Linux Kernel Shootout

FyRE666 writes "Infoworld are currently running an interesting comparison of the 2.4 series kernel against the new 2.6 release on Xeon, Opteron and Itanium CPUs with some surprising benchmark results for common server-related tasks. Basically the new scheduler helps the 2.6 kernel to cream the old 2.4: Samba tests showing up to 73% speed increases, MySQL showing up to 29% and Apache serving dynamic content up to 47% faster!"

Comments

And SCO shows...

[Black Parrot]

...a stunning 129% increase on SPEClawsuit!

drugs are bad

[POds]

Okay, who's been feeding 2.6 speed?

Re:drugs are bad

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

Okay, who's been feeding 2.6 speed?

IBM, according to SCO.

It's shame, really.

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not Linux 2.6.x, it's SCO/Linux 2.6.1.

Good to know that.

[nefele]

So if I use the new and improved herbal 2.6 kernel my processing power will be UP TO 150% BIGGER and my UPTIME will be 200% LONGER!!
And it's only $699 a box! ;-)

just wait

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't wait until the year 2007 when 2.6 finally moves to Debian stable.

Real world vs. fanboy fantasies

[Anonymous Coward]

I am what most people would consider a highly trained technical professional. Unlike most people who spout off at this site, I have the certificates to prove this, and furthermore they're issued by the biggest software company in existence.

I know how to tell facts from marketing fluff. Now, here are the facts as they're found by SEVERAL INDEPENDENT RESEARCH INSTITUTES:

Expenses for file-server workloads under Windows, compared to LinuxOS:

• Staffing expenses were 33.5% better.
  
• Training costs were 32.3% better.
  

They compared Microsofts IIS to the Linux 7.0 webserver. For Windows, the cost was only:

• $40.25 per megabit of throughput per second.
  
• $1.79 per peak request per second.
  

Application development and support costs for Windows compared to an opensores solution like J2EE:

• 28.2% less for large enterprises.
  
• 25.0% less for medium organizations.
  

A full Windows installation, compared to installing Linux, on an Enterprise Server boxen:

• Is nearly three hours faster.
  
• Requires 77% fewer steps.
  

Compared to the best known opensores webserver "Red Hat", Microsoft IIS:

• Has 276% better peak performance for static transactions.
  
• Has 63% better peak performance for dynamic content.
  

These are hard numbers and 100% FACTS! There are several more where these came from.

Who do you think we professionals trust more?
Reliable companies with tried and tested products, or that bedroom coder Thorwalds who publicly admits that he is in fact A HACKER???

--
Copyright (c) 2004 Mike Bouma, MCSE, MCDST, MS Office Specialist

Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2
or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation;
with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover
Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled "GNU
Free Documentation License".

Re:Real world vs. fanboy fantasies

[Anonymous Coward]

And who paid for that research, likely under the stipulation that they wouldn't pay for it if it didn't show results that Microsoft liked?

Microsoft.

You're living in a fantasy land if you think IIS is cheaper than or faster than apache 2.0.x

Re:Real world vs. fanboy fantasies

[Anonymous Coward]

> I'm not even sure why I'm replying to this...it might as well have been generated by a script...

...or a clever troll (winkwink-nodnod)

Re:Real world vs. fanboy fantasies

[rossz]

Unlike most people who spout off at this site, I have the certificates to prove this, and furthermore they're issued by the biggest software company in existence.

Mike Bouma, MCSE, MCDST, MS Office Specialist

You left off the C&C so you owe me a new keyboard.

Re:Real world vs. fanboy fantasies

[uarch]

"...highly trained technical professional"
"I have the certificates to prove this"

Using the phrase highly trained professional in conjunction with an MS cert is nearly worth +5 funny by itself. ;)

Re:Real world vs. fanboy fantasies

[ogre57]

Must .. resist ..

A full Windows installation, compared to installing Linux ..

• Is nearly three hours faster.

Please stay calm. Some nice men in white coats will be here aaanny minute now. They're going to give you a pretty jacket with extra-long sleeves, take your for a niice relaxing ride. Okay? ("nearly three hours faster" .. sure. Full Linux server install I did last week took maybe 30 minutes. Otoh maybe there's some special Dr Who version. :)) )

ahem...

[Apreche]

2.4 is the old and busted
2.6 is the new hotness

Re:Who cares? OS X kicks both.

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh yeah? Well, you're locking yourself into commodity hardware and a cycle of free software upgrades!

Hmm... that comeback doesn't seem as potent as I thought it would be. Oh, wait, I know! You're locking yourself into an eternity of vigilance.

Re:Mystical Mozilla Speed Increases...

[Garg]

Sure, it's right there in the kernel:

if (strcmp(username,"ltorvalds")==0) {
gooseMozilla();
}

Garg

Re:Slashdotted

[Zork the Almighty]

Maybe they were in the process of switching to 2.6.

Re:2.6 on server?

[1000StonedMonkeys]

Well, yes, but it's a safe bet that the speed improvements in 2.6.0 won't disappear in later versions of the kernel.

It may be faster

[Molina the Bofh]

It may be faster, it may be smoother, but I bet it still won't be able to handle the full power of the terrible hordes of slashdotters.

Re:Impressive

[the arbiter]

Nice try, thanks for playing. It's a troll. It hits every article on /.

Re:Impressive

[Serveert]

The pre-emptible kernel(you must enable this, it's off by default) will blow your mind when using a GUI. It is beyond impressive, it's like you're neo and you can see the mouse pointer before it gets to where you move your mouse.

You can grep your hard drive many times yet still browse the web with no slow down.

Re:2.4 versus 2.6: file system performance?

[Debian Troll's Best]

Thanks for the suggestions hdparm, but since I posted my original comment my colleagues and I have decided on taking a hardware-oriented approach to solve our problem. Specifically, this will involve careful removal of the outer metal shell of each of the Seagate Cheetah SCSI hard drives from our RAID1+0 setup and making a few changes to the internal structure of the drive to effectively 'overclock' the hard drives. Let me explain

Stock Seagate Cheetahs use a fairly standard aluminium drive shaft, much like the one in a consumer grade piece of rubbish. We are replacing each of these with a carbon propeller shaft and light-weight fly wheel, which will increase initial acceleration of the drive platters, and will allow them to spin at a maximum speed of 17,500rpm versus the standard 10,000rpm. This should see our rate of apt-get transactions improve dramatically. But that's not all. As any good CPU overclocker knows, 'lapping' the contact surface of their heatsink will remove microscopic imperfections and result in a closer contact between heatsink and CPU. We too will be 'lapping' each hard drive platter. Of course this is dangerous to the platters, so we are always sure to use a fresh Kleenex each time. Once the platters are lapped, we can alter the suspension and damping characteristics of the read/write heads, making them float even closer to the platter and resulting in sportier turn-in, less body roll and more predictable handling even when dealing with 'rough' packages such as Troll Tech's Qt libraries which still have an aura of 'non-free' about them.

Finally we short-circuit resistor A24-J, which amazingly unlocks a special 'developers' mode of the hard drive, and firmware commands may be directly inputted using a text editor. We have developed a set of SCSI firmware routines which recognise the apt-get and .deb file formats even at the lowest level of hardware, offering stellar apt-get-goodness. Using a customised version of apt-get implemented in a mix of x86 assembler and Python (for the performance critical parts), apt-get is now able to bypass the Linux kernel, PC BIOS and the SCSI controller card, and communicate with the hard drive mechanics directly. This adds approximately an extra 60% to overall performance, to say nothing of the improvement in overall reliability and robustness.

We feel that these modifications will result in a drive array that will provide a superior platform for high-throughput enterprise level apt-get package management, regardless of filesystem. In fact we have very little choice about filesystem, since the lapping procedure with the Kleenex irreversibly etches tracks and sectors onto the drive surface. No need to worry about 5% of the drive being wasted on superuser-only space after a reformat! Now, I realise that these types of hardware mods may not be in the reach of all Debian users out there. I'm happy to discuss this further with the community if necessary. I am also creating a HOW-TO, which will be distributed via apt-get mirrors in the form of an 'info' document (man pages are filled with inaccuracies due to the inherently lossy compression techniques used in their production. RMS was really onto something with info!!!).

I look forward to the GNU/community's feedback.

from the bang-bang dept.

[HalliS]

This is what the 2.4. kernel had to say about this:

Bang bang it shot me down
Bang bang I hit the ground
Bang bang that awful sound
Bang bang my brother shot me down

I was 2.4 and he was 2.6
We rode on horses made of sticks
He wore black and I wore white
He could always win the fight
...

Yeah, I know it's pretty crappy, but it's past my bedtime and I'm tired ^_^