How do I get MySQL to run at full speed?

• Start mysqld with the right options. More memory gives more speed if you have it. See section How does one change the size of MySQL buffers?.
• Create indexes to make your SELECTs faster. See section How does MySQL use indexes?
• Optimize your column types to be as efficient as possible. Use NOT NULL on all columns. See section How should I arrange my table to be as fast/small as possible?
• --skip-locking disables file locking between SQL requests. This gives a greater speed but has the following consequences:
  • One MUST flush all tables with mysqladmin refresh before one tries to check/repair tables with isamchk. (isamchk -d table_name is always allowed).
  • One can't run two MySQL servers one the same data files, if both are going to update the same tables.
  The --skip-locking is on by default when compiling with MIT threads. This is because flock() isn't fully supported by MIT threads on all platforms.
• If updates are a problem, one can delay updates and then do many updates in a row later. Many updates done in a row are much quicker than one at a time.
• If the problem is with MIT threads and one is using FreeBSD, upgrading to FreeBSD 3.0 (or higher) should help. This gives a possibility to use sockets (quicker than the current TCP/IP with MIT threads) and the thread package is much more integrated.

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