I just did a test with a base install of Postfix from a mandrake RPM (I know this is not the most efficient setup). When the spools were on fixed disk, I was able to send about 11 messages per second. When I switched to a ramdisk for the spools, performace jumped to about 67 messages per second. So there was an obvoius performance increase here, though I am just using a standard home PC class IDE hard drive (Maxtor 52049H4). What do you think the difference would be with better drives? Jay On Thursday 10 January 2002 11:05 am, you wrote: > ON Thu, Jan 10, 2002 at 08:01:06AM -0600, Nate Straz wrote: > > On Thu, Jan 10, 2002 at 12:52:54AM -0600, Michael Burns wrote: > > > A RAM-disk approach should work, but it may or may not be significantly > > > faster than conventional disks. It's certainly unorthodox. > > > > Don't be silly. You should be able to tune the OS's disk caching enough > > that it's as fast as a RAM disk and not as dangerous. "Imagine running > > this on a ramdisk" is just like saying, "imagine a beowulf of these." > > It's a mail queue. I wouldn't expect the system to hit the files often > enough for the cache to make a difference, and so I'm not sure your > objection applies.