Timestamp VS smallint autoincr ORDER BY ..?

Hi all,

would anyone out there know which situation would be most efficient in terms of less server processing time/resources?

i need a column in my database just for the purpose of doing an occasional ORDER BY either ASC or DESC.

would a timestamp(14) or (12) be better than say...a smallint with an autoincrement?

or is this a trivial question because they would require essentially the same processor resources and time? is there other "better" options??

thanks!

A tiny int would probably be more efficient. Much easier to sort for order by clauses and less memory consumed to hold them...