The author makes a huge leap, "The core, implicit assumption behind Oracle RAC, IBM DB2, and many other database clustering solutions, is that failure can be a

The author makes a huge leap, "The core, implicit assumption behind Oracle RAC, IBM DB2, and many other database clustering solutions, is that failure can be avoided by purchasing high-end disk storage and using expensive hardware (fiber optics, etc). As can be seen from the research I mentioned earlier, this core assumption doesn’t correlate with the failure statistics. Hence I argue that the database clustering model is inherently breakable." Taking the fact that drives fail and extrapolating that to mean that large drive arrays are "inherently breakable" is nonsense. Using an EMC Symmetrix as an example I am very familiar with, a large properly implemented storage array is far from breakable. Inside that box you buy is a whole collection of n+2, n+3 and/or n+4 components all built specifically to never, ever break. The only problem with this type of solution is it is priced in the multi-millions. Each.