Slow insert performance using postgreSQL and PEAR

Hi All, We did a simple benchmark on PEAR DB 1.4 and Postgresql 7.x running under Redhat Linux 8.x. To do the benchmark, we wrote a simple php script which would be called by the browser. This script does a X number inserts into a table. What we noticed was the following; 1. When the fsync option is on(i.e. postmaster is started without the -F option), for 50,000 inserts it took about 5 hours. 2. With fsync turned off in postgresql, the time came down to approximately 90 seconds. In both these cases, autocommit was on 3. With one single long running transaction, the time came down to 61 seconds. 4. Without using PEAR, using postgresql functions such as pg_connect, the time came down to 30 seconds. Now our question is, 1. Why is such a large difference between 3 and 4. 2. Is PEAR adding so much overhead or is it something that we doing wrong. When you look at the pear DB code, it's calling the same postgresql functions!!. Is there a way to optimize this situation? 3. There are different ways of connecting to postgresql, such as unix domain sockets and TCP/IP sockets. Is it possible that pg_connect is using a different mechanism as compared to the call being made through PEAR DB? BTW, we are using large number of insert statements to optimize our postgresql installation. In our real application, this effect would be achieved by multiple simultaneous clients connecting to PHP/postgres instance. Regards kg