🚀 go-pugleaf

Sorry, I did not mean to start a debate.  Our application is very small. 
  We have retail book stores that will most likely never need more than 
6 computers used as point-of-sale units.  Connecting between stores is 
done over DSL for small, single-customer inquiries on a very limited 
basis.  Scalability beyond this level is not significantly likely for 
these bookstore applications.

Each computer is a single user from our standpoint, but may be as many 
as three concurrently running programs, each with multiple databases and 
multiple streams to the same table(s) open to the server.  If we count 
only the open databases (we use Delphi), each user would have only about 
  6 connections open at any point in time.  If we counted tables & 
queries, each user could have from 60 to 80 open at any given point.

Coming from a Paradox background, we did not expand much in our 
capabilities when we went to IB, as straight a conversion as we could 
do.  That is why we used IBO.  We just needed a simple minded database 
system.  IB was really overkill, but it came with Delphi and then 
Borland made the open source version available.

Using the newer dual-core, hyper-threaded processor boards appears 
inevitable since we just buy computers off the shelf and we have been 
getting some of these when we purchase systems in the $400 range.  If 
these are the same as SMP systems, then that needs to guide our 
direction also. This is only reason we are even looking at changing from 
IB 6.0.2.0 at this point.

With three stores (more in the future), if it is only about $700 per 
store for IB, that is not a big deal unless we have to keep upgrading 
and paying again.