I'm noticing that INSERT performance is very much IO bound (at least
on 1.0.x). So here is my question. I have multiple machines posting
data to a server, the server then inserts data into the database on
multiple threads. It uses a thread for each connection. As a result,
my inserts into the database happen on multiple threads.

Would bulk insert performance be increased if I forced all these
inserts into a single thread, making them synchronous? I'm wonder if
the inserts from multiple threads makes the hard disk write head a
little schizophrenic and actually decreases INSERT performance?

Also, is 1.5 IO bound in the same way as 1.0.3 for INSERTs or is a
different writing mechanism used to relieve some of this.

TIA,

R.