I have a question about the right database type to use with a script. First though, a bit of background:

I am using ActiveState's perl 5.8 on a win32 platform (Windows 2000 to be exact, but this will be portable between win32 platforms). I have access to and can install nearly any database available for win32 systems.

My script is gathering data from a couple of sources and storing it now in a few flat text files. I need to expand my script to grab more data and store it all. My estimations show that I will start with about 600 rows and about 20 columns of data. None of the data being grabbed will exceed 20 characters. I do expect the database to grow to somewhere around 75,000-100,000 rows of data with everything else remaining the same. Knowing the data that will be stored, I am leaning toward a relational database but my main concern with all of this is getting the data the fastest way possible.

I have not used perl to store or retrieve data from anything other than flat-files to this point. Is there a preference amongst the people here on the database to use? Is there a certain database type or structure that perl works with better than others? Any pointers to any place that this question has already been answered?

Thanks in advance for your help.