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NT vs. Linux - Mindcraft Vindicates Itself
MauricioAP writes "the new benchmarks from mindcraft, or the NT vs. linux, aren't good for Linux, especially for RH guys.
Check this out." Reliability and "bang per $$" aren't addressed by this test or the results might have been quite different. But within the limited parameters, which may or may not accurately reflect real-world conditions, it looks like Mindcraft has been quite fair. (Please read carefully before judging.)
Note the date at the top of the referenced page - June 30, 99. (Which explains why they are using old builds of Linux and old NT service packs.)
-Blake (who didn't realize the Linux crowd hadn't already looked at this updated benchmark
Note, however, that the tested kernel (2.2.6) is one prior to the single-threaded-TCP fix. I would like to see these tests done with a more recent kernel.
Again, we must concede that on unrealistically high loads, in an unrealistic test scenario, a professionally tuned very-high-end PC with 4 CPU will outperform an older Linux kernel.
However (sorry Microsoft), that doesn't matter to me. What is also important is reliability, maintainability, cost, support, standards-compliance, and a host of other things. For me, Linux still beats NT when all these factors are considered. Also, if I wanted a very high-end SMP box for web serving, I'd probably choose Solaris anyway. Microsoft, you're barking up the wrong tree. Let's see this test repeated, but compare NT with a Sun UE450 next time.
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The early bird catches the worm. The worm that sleeps late lives to see another day.
Mindcraft:
The major performance problems are with the TCP stack, which is single threaded in the 2.2.x Linux kernels, and with large-grained kernel locks that degrade multiprocessor performance. The Linux community is addressing these performance problems and others in their 2.3.x kernel series.
Well, I'm glad that they recognise that work is being done on this. It is very much the case that Linux does have SMP scalability problems, and I think we all knew that prior to this report.
Regardless, I still stand by the old motto, there are lies, damned lies and statistics, run Linux, run BSD, run NT, do what you will, but be sure to be happy, with what you run. I would like to see how NT fares against Linux & BSD in the real world, how about this test:
The test will last for one year.
The machines will be under constant varying Web & File serving Load.
The NT box will also run a 16-bit application.
I think we all know what's going to happen over time here...
You can't test NT performance over 15minutes of file/web-serving, NT may have only leaked 15Mbs of the available 1Gb in that time.
OK, I don't know whether they tested for 15minutes or not, but I did look and cannot find anything regarding the duration of the tests. Can someone please comment on this?
Some people may flame me saying, "You don't care anymore because Linux is losing." Wrong answer.
Here's why: I LIKE LINUX
I genuinely like it. Yeah, so these benchmarks say it is not as fast or as "good." What is good anyway? Good to me is: reliability, configurability, usability, extensibility, scalibility, inexpensiveness, fun, etc. Linux shines in all of these areas and more. Yes, that's right, I said Linux is FUN. Linux is plainly more fun to use. I don't care what any some benchmarks say. We all know that benchmarks are unrealistic. They don't test "real world" conditions and situations. I think we should use their criticisms (only if valid, of course) to help Linux be a better operating system, not to beat some other OS.
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"Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds." - Albert Einstein
Co-founder and designer at Music Nearby: http://musicnearby.com
I'm sorry, but that post is just so wrong it is laughable. If you had found some site that ran NT and was faster than Slashdot (not hard to do) you would be flamed out of existance.
Where to start?
Slashdot does use multiple webserver - it caches static pages, and
Slashdot does not use Oracle it uses MySQL. Big difference in websites.
"The response time is always good" ????? Not from where I am (Australia) it isn't. Subjectivly, dvdexpress seemed faster to me. Anyway, what does that prove? You are closer to Slashdot than dvdexpress? Slashdot has more bandwidth?
Dvd is graphic intensive, and takes longer to render in Netscape, too.
You can't compare two totally dissimilar sites, on totally different hardware.
I bet I can find apache sites that seem slower than NT/IIS sites. EG: www.Apache.org always seems very slow to me. What does that prove? NOTHING!!!!
Look, I want Linux to be faster than NT as much as anyone, but we can't even be seen trying to spread FUD like MS does. Imagine if MS stuck that up at Comdex as by "a Linux Hacker, posting on the Linux nerd site slashdot.org".
People, please think for a moment before you post, and before you moderate comments like that up. Ask yourself this:
Reader of Slashdot don't need to see arguments for Linux like this, we need to see the opposing view, so we can learn what we need to improve.
Damn.. I just know this will kill my karma, but that is crazy!
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Though the PCWeek tests favour NT (for reasons well covered elsewhere), they do not do so by the ludicrous margin the original tests gave, and the Linux's community's cries of "foul" were entirely just and accurate: these tests show that Mindcraft did indeed load the die.
Furthermore, Weiner has never managed to justify the claim that he had asked for help in "several Linux discussion groups" when setting up the first test: searches show that he only posted *one* article, and that was met with requests for clarification that was never forthcoming. So as it stands we're quite justified in believing that Weiner is a flat-out liar on top of his other sins. That's not vindication.
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The real problem with the Mindcraft benchmark has nothing to do with most of what they cited: the graphs are painfully clear that the limited resource is network bandwidth. That's why it's so funny when they say "We'd never test a server that's resource-limited. What's the point?" That's what I'd ask them now.
Note that they test with one and with four processors, but do not test with one or two ethernet cards. In fact, they never mention the complete hardware configuration of the machine, so we just have to assume they used the same f*cked-up four ethernet card configuration.
There were actually benchmarks put out by c't explaining this, with graphs, and real tasks. Linux performance generally did much better until that second ethernet card was added. I'll believe them, that it's a software limitation in the TCP stack, but I'll also believe that they were exploiting a known problem in the Linux kernel--that only happens under these strange conditions--to their ends. Until they show some benchmarks with the ethernet cards mentioned as a factor.
NT vs. Linux Server Benchmarks: informative and interesting, but most of all truthful, with a link to the c't article I mentioned, and many other more realistic benchmarks.
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pb Reply rather than vaguely moderate me.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.