What we are trying to do is take the load off the database and put it in the script. We have MANY variables associated with the banner, like weighting, size, subjects it favours, subjects it rejects, time targeting and so on... we also have a cookie-based profile of the individual banner viewer that we use to judge what would be the best banner for them to see at any one time.

The problem with all this stuff is that we cant put it in the SELECT statement, as this would make it about 20 lines long and span about 3 tables, so what we are trying to do is do a SELECT * FROM banners, and then do a loop that goes through each banner and assigns it points based on the individual criteria, and then do a bit of fuzzy random logic to pick the best one. We are moving the processing overhead from our database server to our individual banner servers.

So yes, we do need to do the entire SELECT statement, which is why I am wondering how we can reduce the load... we only have to select four individual rows from the DB, is it quicker to do select a, b, c, d FROM... instead of SELECT *? I think it is, but I am not sure by what degree.... Also, if there is a criterion that always means a banner is inactive, would it slow us down if we used SELECT a, b, c, d FROM banners WHERE weighting=inactive?