[NOTE: I'm a pgsql newbie myself.  Take this reply with a large-ish
grain of salt!)
Shouldn't it be something straightforward like:
select a.a, a.b, a.c, ...
  from a a,
       b b
 where a.x = b.x,
       and a.y = b.y, ...   (I'd watch out for too many clauses here...
                if you've got a lot of clauses, you're probably not normalized
                as much as you should be.)
If you have indexes on the relevant fields, you shouldn't get a table
scan and this should return rather quickly, right?
-Ken
"Diehl, Jeffrey" wrote:
>
> I'm having difficulty writing a query which I really can't live without...
>
> I need to get a list of records from table A for which there are
> corresponding records in table B.  I've tried to use the intersect clause,
> but it doesn't seem to work, or it runs far too long.  For example:
>
> select * from A
>         where 1=1
>         intersect select * from A where
>         B.x=A.x
>         and A.y=B.y
>         and A.z=B.z
>         limit 100
>
> I need the most efficient method possible; my A tables have upward of 5
> Million records.  The B table, btw, only has about 100 records.
>
> Any help will be most appreciated.