11g 64-bit memory honesty

[mightyscotchpine]

An Oracle DBA at our office is telling me that "11g 64-bit on Linux will not run with less than 8GB of RAM". I am a Sysadmin, not a DBA, so I don't have the technical expertise to know if this is true, but it seems like a drastic oversimplification. I would imagine that a large enough DB, with enough concurrent users, coupled with enough other Oracle applications, could push the RAM requirement of the server up to 8GB or way beyond. Correct? If so, then our DBA's statement is just a outlandish oversimplification?

Please don't circle the wagons on this question - I just want an honest answer. I'm not looking to call our DBA out on this, but if my suspicions are correct I want to be able to go to him and talk with him about it. I feel the Sysadmin/DBA relationship needs to be completely honest to be effective.

 

[jaxtell]

According to Oracle, 1 GB is enough.

-----------------------------------------
I cannot be bought. Find leasing information at

http://www.joshaxtell.com/

 

[karluk]

If your dba really made this statement about Oracle needing an 8 GB minimum of RAM on 64 bit Linux, then that he or she is mistaken and should be corrected. But I suspect that this is may not be an exact quote. Dbas are generally not prone to histrionics and exaggeration. Oracle has a well-deserved reputation as a memory hog, so trying to run Oracle on a server that is short on memory is bound to lead to all sorts of problems down the road. Probably 90% of the time you will get more bang for your buck by adding RAM to an Oracle server rather than adding a CPU or buying a faster disk subsystem. If that is what your dba was trying to say, then I agree.