To Hyperthread or Not.

[K-MaC]

Hello all. We are going to be virtualizing an Oracle database on a new server with a single Xeon E5540 processor. All of the documentation that I have read so far states that it is best to disable Hyperthreading. However, I have been unable to find a concrete answer as to why to run with it disabled. Could someone with experience let me know the advantages and disadvanges of Hyperthreading as it relates to running a virtualized instance of Oracle.

We will be using ESX4 standard edition and the Oracle server will be lightly utilized.

Thanks in advance for any and all insight.

Cheers

Kevin

[AntonVZhbankov]

It is recommended to utilize HT on Nehalems.

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MCSA, MCTS, VCP, VMware vExpert '2009

http://blog.vadmin.ru

[TobiasKracht · Accepted solution]

There was a problem with old Intel`s CPU. But according to new tests using HyperThreading in new Nehalem-based CPUs allows to enlarge perfomance.

StarWind Software R&D

[weinstein5]

VMware's best practice is to enable hyperthreading when available - think of it this it is giving the vmkernel more logical cpus to schedule virtual cpus -

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[K-MaC]

Well that's 3 votes out of 3 for using Hyperthreading. I appreciate all the answers. However, I just have one question. Does anyone have a link to a paper/guide where it states to use Hyperthreading in Oracle? If not that's fine I will go with the best practice but it would be nice to have the paper! Again I thank you all.

Cheers

Kevin