From owner-freebsd-chat  Wed Nov 26 09:07:14 1997
Return-Path: <owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG>
Received: (from majordom@localhost)
          by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) id JAA01629
          for chat-outgoing; Wed, 26 Nov 1997 09:07:14 -0800 (PST)
          (envelope-from owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG)
Received: from implode.root.com (implode.root.com [198.145.90.17])
          by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) with ESMTP id JAA01625
          for <chat@FreeBSD.ORG>; Wed, 26 Nov 1997 09:07:08 -0800 (PST)
          (envelope-from root@implode.root.com)
Received: from implode.root.com (localhost [127.0.0.1])
	by implode.root.com (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id JAA19999;
	Wed, 26 Nov 1997 09:09:56 -0800 (PST)
Message-Id: <199711261709.JAA19999@implode.root.com>
To: Nate Williams <nate@mt.sri.com>
cc: C.R.Harding@massey.ac.nz, chat@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: Heavily loaded mail servers - any stats? 
In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 26 Nov 1997 08:44:17 MST."
             <199711261544.IAA02670@mt.sri.com> 
From: David Greenman <dg@root.com>
Reply-To: dg@root.com
Date: Wed, 26 Nov 1997 09:09:56 -0800
Sender: owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG
Precedence: bulk
X-Loop: FreeBSD.org

>> I've been involved in a discussion with some people locally regarding 
>> large mail volumes and the size of servers needed to cope with it. 
>> They believe that 700,000 pieces of email per month (their current 
>> traffic) is an enormous load and requires big, expensive name-brand 
>> servers to deal with.
>
>Heck, that's *nothing*.  Forget 'big heavy servers', if you're on a
>significant number of FreeBSD mailing lists you're getting close to
>10K/month, and that's per/user.  700K/month is chicken feed, and I'm
>sure my 486/66 with FreeBSD could handle with w/out even breaking a
>sweat.  Using a nice round 1 million email number a month gives you
>approximately 24/minute, which means that youre server is probably more
>I/O bound than CPU bound.  Get a good fast disk on the box and have at
>it.

   Funny, actually. hub.freebsd.org sends out 1.5 *million* messages per
*week* - about 6 million per month...so .7 million/month is a tiny amount
of email, really. :-)

-DG

David Greenman
Core-team/Principal Architect, The FreeBSD Project