System Requirements
Hardwareβ
ScramDB scales with the machine it's given. There's no hard minimum enforced by the engine; these are sizing guidelines, not a compatibility gate.
| Component | Guidance |
|---|---|
| CPU | More cores means more parallel query workers. Size to your expected concurrent query load; see Parallelism for how many worker threads a given limit actually spawns. |
| RAM | Used for the buffer pool, per-query execution memory, and the JIT compiler. Size with buffer_pool_percent / execution_memory_percent (auto-scales from detected RAM, or the container's cgroup limit) or pin exact byte values. Leave headroom for the OS. |
| Storage | NVMe SSD strongly recommended. ScramDB's default I/O backend uses direct I/O (bypassing the OS page cache) for its columnar storage, so scans reward fast sequential throughput. |
Performance Notesβ
- CPU cores: how many worker threads ScramDB spawns depends on the container or OS CPU limit, not just the physical core count. See Parallelism for the resolution mechanism, the recommendation ladder, and the
SCRAMDB_MAX_CORESoverride. - Memory: The buffer pool is the primary memory consumer. Set
buffer_pool_percent(orbuffer_pool_size_bytesto pin an exact size) andexecution_memory_percentunder[storage]in the configuration file. Sizing reads the container's cgroup memory limit first, falling back to host memory, so a--memorycap is genuinely honored by the percent-based defaults. - Storage: NVMe SSDs are recommended for the columnar storage engine. The default I/O backend uses direct I/O to bypass the OS page cache; other backends are opt-in.
- JIT: the JIT compiler holds some additional memory for its context, shared across all queries. We haven't published a measured figure for this; don't budget against a specific number today.
Supported Platformsβ
ScramDB's officially published deployment path is the Linux Docker image, built and tested for linux/amd64 and linux/arm64. If you need to run on a platform outside that (macOS, Windows, a non-containerized build), talk to your account team about current support: this page doesn't carry forward unverified platform claims from a previous revision.