Trends in retrieval system performance

摘要

Computer technology is continually developing, with on-going rapid improvements in processor speed and disk capacity. At the same time, demands on retrieval systems are increasing, with, in applications such as World-Wide Web search engines, growth in data volumes outstripping gains in hardware performance. In this paper we experimentally explore the relationship between hardware and data volumes using a new framework designed for retrieval systems. We show that changes in performance depend entirely on the application: in some cases, even with large increases in data volume, the faster hardware allows improvements in response time; but in other cases, performance degrades far more than either raw hardware statistics or speed on processor-bound tasks would suggest. Overall, it appears that seek times rather than processor limitations are a crucial bottleneck and there is little likelihood of reductions in retrieval system response time without improvements in disk performance.