First let me qualify that I am new at using FileMaker. We have a "small" FileMaker system with 20 files. Of which none are large, one has 22,000 records and the second has 10,000 records. The problem is accessing any of the data takes a very long time. I have read about people accessing hundreds of thousands of rows of data in seconds. Is this due to the speed of their hard drive? We have FM server set up on a Windows XP Pro machine with no other applications running on it. The machine has a 40 gig drive running at 5400 rpm. Would a 7200 rpm drive make a difference? I know that FM recommends SCSI but that is not possible right now.

Thanks for the help!!!

I'm at what sounds like about your level with Filemaker... I have a "small" FileMaker system with about 20 files, and somewhat fewer records..

I moved Filemaker from an older Mac (a Beige G3) to a newer one, an "old model" iMac.

The iMac has a faster HD (it's a 5400rpm, but the old one was a slower interface) and it has 10/100 Ethernet whereas the G3 had 10Base-T.

Access to the data sped up about 50%.

Can't say for sure WHAT sped it up, but take that for what you will...

Get a 7200rpm drive with a big cache, make sure you have a 10/100 or 100Base-T network, make sure you have "enough" RAM.

Maybe someone more experienced than I can be more specific.....

Paul F.

The data itself can certainly be a factor. Are you displaying or searching non-indexed fields?

I'd look at the data as Fitch mentioned. With 22K records, something like a "Today" function or an unstored calc field that displays can slow it down to a crawl with that many records.

Also - non FileMaker native graphics can slow it down as well.

FM file with 2 022 990 records 733 MB

Index unindexed field: 4 min 20 sec.

Search on unindexed: 1 min 40 sec

Search on indexed: less than 1 second

Sort 100: less than 1 second

Sort 1000: less than 1 second

Sort 10 000: less than 1 second

Sort 100 000: 4 seconds

Sort 1 000 000: 44 seconds

Sort all of 2 022 990: 95 seconds

That was on P4, 2.6 GHz, 7200 RPM Seagate 8 MB cache and W2k.

And everything in above posts is also playing big role in FM performance