> Background:
> I have been reading a lot of posts on whether or not to store image
> files in blobs. From what I've read the major issue with this is that
> queries can be/are slowed by the blob. The common way to handle
> images
> is to store the image in the file system and a reference to it in a
> column. This works in most cases, but in this particular case I have
> such a high volume of images that filesystem limitations come into
> play.
>
> Image description: 2-page tiff aprox. size 24k
> Current image count: 25,550,000
> Daily addition: 7,000 +-
>
> Questions:
>
> 1. If the image files/blobs were stored separate from the data in
> their
> own table, would there be an impact on overall database performance?

If the blobs are larger than db page size, then they will be stored
on separate pages anyway, so there is no point in creating another table.

>
> 2. Can Firebird handle this volume of data?

Can't say, my biggest database with pictures in blobs was 70GB,
and it worked without problems.

Ivan
http://www.volny.cz/iprenosil/interbase/