The best databases in the world perform better on AMD EPYC processors.
Oracle Exadata
They at AMD think that their EPYC processors are the finest data center CPUs available. Their clients concur. EPYC processors have become widely used, as shown by the fact that they run the Frontier system at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the most powerful supercomputer in the world, and that they are used in over 800 public cloud instances across all major cloud service providers. Businesses are using more and more EPYC CPUs to power their on-premise infrastructures across all business verticals.
Indeed, AMD EPYC now holds over 300 world records for efficiency and performance, both on-site and in the cloud. However, did you realize that data management and analytics account for more than 50 of those records? This indicates that AMD EPYC is the best option available for processing the most important and fundamental business tasks in the globe.
The two databases that big businesses use the most often are Oracle and Microsoft SQL Server. AMD’s 4th Gen EPYC CPUs provide impressive performance whether you’re using Microsoft SQL Server or the Oracle Exadata Database Platform. First, let’s examine the Oracle Exadata platform to understand how AMD EPYC has contributed to the advancement of database computing.
The Database Platform for Oracle Exadata
Managing workloads for Oracle Exadata databases is a major endeavor. Exadata offers real-time vector search capabilities, analytics, and fast transaction processing. Tasks that are vital to the mission may be handled by the Exadata system. These workloads allow for the instantaneous completion of online financial transactions while instantly detecting fraudulent activity. These database workloads help carriers maintain their networks and keep up with the increasing needs of the worldwide 5G network. They also keep the internet transactions flowing, particularly during the peak shopping seasons of Cyber Monday and Single’s Day.
Oracle developed the Oracle Exadata Database Platform to provide performance, scalability, availability, and security while supporting these workloads. This platform, which includes hardware, software, and an Oracle database, is simple to set up.
Oracle made a significant shift in 2023 after depending on Intel CPUs for years to power the Oracle Exadata Database Platform. Oracle decided to employ the 4th generation AMD EPYC CPU (previously code-named “Genoa”) in the most recent version X10M Exadata system in order to achieve better performance and energy efficiency.
Exadata Oracle
Think about the impact that EPYC CPUs have: Compared to the preceding Exadata X9M-2 system, the Exadata X10M Database Platform features three times more database server cores per socket from 32 to 96 cores thanks to AMD EPYC CPUs. More EPYC CPU cores simply translate into more database transactions and quicker analytics when combined with Oracle’s optimized software.
Meanwhile, the dual-socket X10M Database server can now tackle tasks that previously needed pricey and power-hungry 8-socket servers thanks to its remarkable core count. An organization may recover precious space in the data center and save energy by using fewer, smaller servers to do the same tasks.
X10M Database server
In order to ensure that database performance grows linearly with a core count of up to 192 per Database Server (2 X 96 core CPUs), AMD and Oracle worked together to enhance the performance of the new Exadata X10M server. Exadata system software, on the other hand, can encrypt and decrypt data quicker than other components can get it to the chip thanks to the 4th generation AMD EPYC CPU. Furthermore, the Exadata system software was tailored to take full use of AMD EPYC’s reliability, availability, and serviceability (RAS) features. One example of this is Platform First Error Handling, which improves the uptime of workloads related to key databases.
Microsoft SQL Server
Let’s now examine Microsoft SQL Server and see how AMD EPYC leads the industry in database transaction processing speed. Businesses often utilize the TPC (Transaction Processing Performance Council) benchmarks to assess processor performance as well as the overall performance of server systems. To guarantee the validity of the benchmark test findings, TPC.org has an audited library of benchmarks. Let’s examine two widely used TPC benchmarks to assess database performance: TPC-E and TPC-H.
Decision support systems that analyze vast amounts of data, carry out intricate queries, and respond to important business inquiries are evaluated using the TPC-H benchmark. According to this test, the best performance the most queries per hour is achieved by a non-clustered system running Microsoft SQL Server 2022 on a 64-core 4th Gen AMD EPYC CPU. Performance on the AMD-based system is 14% better than that of a system powered by the most recent 5th Gen Intel Xeon 8592+. To put it another way, the firm can evaluate data considerably more quickly and get business outcomes since there are 14% more inquiries answered in an hour.
The findings shown above pertain to a database with a 10TB size. Furthermore, the TPC-H findings show that AMD EPYC powered systems also provide the best non clustered performance for 3 TB (EPYCWR-869) and 1 TB databases (EPYCWR-865).
In the meanwhile, online transaction processing (OLTP) is measured by the TPC-E benchmark. There are twelve simultaneous transactions of varying kinds and complexity involved. Either online or time- or price-based criteria are used to initiate the transactions.
Once again, while running Microsoft SQL Server 2022, the AMD-based system achieves the greatest performance for a non-clustered server on the TPC-E benchmark. When compared to a system using a 5th generation Intel Xeon CPU, the system built around the 4th generation AMD EPYC processor performs 7% better.
In summary
AMD has shown that its EPYC CPUs provide the greatest performance available on the market when used with Microsoft SQL Server and Oracle Exadata databases. It is not worth taking shortcuts when it comes to organizing and evaluating data that is essential to the continuous operation of your organization.
AMD continues to set the standard in the server industry with the upcoming release of 5th Gen EPYC CPUs. For the highest database workloads, AMD’s unrivaled 4th Gen EPYC CPUs are the obvious option for the finest database performance in the interim.
