Performance question

[Alan Fiebig]

>To many MailScanner children running? - you mentioned 17

I have MS set for 9 children, so the 17 I mentioned seeing in TOP
indicated that not all were running at that instant. As I understand it,
it child will register 2 instances running. Plus one for the controlling
process. So ((17 - 1) / 2) would mean 8 children alive at that time.

Now, as to the question of is that too many... How many is too many? If
According to the docs, the number of children is based on the number of
processors.

Is it the actual number of procesors, or is it the amount of resulting
processing power? Can a quad processor with a 300MHZ pent II handle more
children than a single 2.4GHZ pent 4?

I started increasing my number of children until I got to the point where
either CPU was exhausted, or I saw them starting to get swapped out. Then
I backed off.

As my CPU load never exceeded 10%, I figured I had plenty of CPU power
for 9 children. I didn't go higher than 9 though, as my ram ran out
then and they started getting swapped out.

-Alan