Oracle has changed its licensing policies for dual-core processors, bringing pricing schemes more in line with those of its rivals.

The database vendor previously charged its enterprise software per processing core, meaning that a server running on a dual-core processor required two software licences.

Oracle has now announced on it website that each core will count as 0.75 processors. 

A database running on a single server with one quadruple-core processor will therefore require three processor licences. Fractions will be rounded up, so a dual-core processor still requires two licences.

Competing infrastructure software vendors including IBM, Microsoft and Red Hat only count physical computer chips when calculating licensing fees, regardless of the number of processor cores per socket.

Oracle was one of the last to hold out in the move away from per-core licensing schemes.

Chip makers AMD and Intel only recently introduced dual-core x86 processors. Multiple-core processors are already common in high-end servers from vendors including IBM and Sun Microsystems.

Intel and AMD have said that policies such as Oracle's prevent enterprise adoption of dual-core x86 servers because the savings of the hardware are offset by the increased license fees.