Huh. Thanks for taking the time to outline this, I don't know why it never occurred to me. I have to admit, I'm unfamiliar with "rasters" in the way you seem to be referencing them. It sounds, though, like the relational bits of the DB are really being used more as a file system than a database, if there are even really distinctions in the first place. If "a couple thousand rows" are basically being used as a metadata store for the rasters, is that an unusual use of the database, or is everybody doing this and I just never had enough data to care?