No system runs as fast as we need it to run, and any computer's performance can be improved.
We can improve the performance of a system by turning off unused services, by tuning the kernel parameters, or by adding new hardware.
The first step in tuning a system is understanding what the demands are and whether they are being met. Different types of applications have different critical needs. The questions to ask yourself include the following:
- Is the CPU the critical resource for this system? A system doing engineering simulations requires CPU cycles more than other resources.
- Is network bandwidth critical for this system? A file server does little computation, but can saturate its network capacity.
- Is disk access speed critical for this system? A file server or database server will put more demand on the disks than a calculation engine does.
- Is RAM the critical resource for this system? All systems...