lookups vs. large number of records

[burdenslifted]

I am working on an older server-based database, now on FM 10. The database is set up with two separate files, a song file with info on songs and a sales file with info on individual song sales (downloads) that is imported from an online retail outlet. The sales file is 900,000 records and growing. The database was set up to use lookups from the song file to the sales file, rather than importing sales records into a table in the song database, on the the theory that so many records would bog down the database. Which is better, using lookups or keeping that many records in a single database?

[bruceR]

The question doesn't make sense. The two choices are not alternatives to each other.

[burdenslifted]

Okay, that's sort of what I thought, but needed to check it out. Legacy database you know -- thought someone before me might have known what they were doing, but apparently not so much.