I've got a data grid with pages with more than 10k rows so its very slow when it first loads. whats the best way of solving this problem. I've read that JDBC paging is the usual solution for such problem but some people are saying to use SQL ROWNUM is an easier solution so I wanted to ask first.

If you think paging is the best solution could you please give me a couple of pointers on how to go on about it(link to implimentation etc)

Check this link about pagination Queries in Oracle.

http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/issue-archive/2007/07-jan/o17asktom-093877.html

Based on the two input parameters ( (1) Page number and (2) number of results to be displayed per page), you can use the query to get the results you need.

Also check the query that Don Roby pointed to above. It is just as good, but I wanted to point you to more oracle specific information and how it is processed.