For Day 15 of this series, I will be covering a few tools that can be used for hardware identification. Since quite a few database professionals do not have direct access to their database servers (i.e. they cannot login to their database server via RDP), I will talk about what you can learn about your [...]
Glenn Berry
Semi-random musings about SQL Server performance
A SQL Server Hardware Tidbit a Day – Day 15
Posted on: April 15, 2013 3:08 pm
Estimating Data Compression Savings in SQL Server 2012
Posted on: April 12, 2013 12:30 pm
SQL Server Data Compression (which was first introduced in SQL Server 2008, and is an Enterprise Edition only feature) lets you compress individual indexes with either ROW or PAGE compression. It can be a huge win for many SQL Server workloads, by letting you reduce both your required disk I/O and your memory usage at [...]
How to Find Out About the Latest SQL Server Service Packs and Cumulative Updates
Posted on: April 3, 2013 3:12 pm
Since someone asked me about this today, I thought I would write about it. Aaron Bertrand (blog|twitter) and I sort of have a friendly competition to be the first to blog when a new SQL Server CU is released. I don’t know of any e-mail notification service for Service Packs and Cumulative Updates from Microsoft. [...]
SQL Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 1 Cumulative Update 11
Posted on: February 25, 2013 2:39 pm
On February 18, 2013, Microsoft released SQL Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 1 Cumulative Update 11, which is Build 10.50.2869. There are only four fixes in the public fix list for this cumulative update. This cumulative update is only for SQL Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 1. If you have a different version and/or service [...]
SQL Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 2 Cumulative Update 5
Posted on: February 25, 2013 1:49 pm
On February 18, 2013, Microsoft released SQL Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 2 Cumulative Update 5, which is Build 10.50.4276. There are 21 fixes in the public fix list for this cumulative update, which is a pretty decent amount of fixes. This cumulative update is only for SQL Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 2. If [...]
Important Hotfix for SQL Server 2008 and Newer
Posted on: January 10, 2013 1:46 pm
Microsoft recently released a hotfix for a memory leak leak issue that affects SQL Server 2008, SQL Server 2008 R2, and SQL Server 2012. This memory leak only occurs if the have the AUTO_UPDATE_STATISTICS_ASYNC database level setting enabled for any of your databases. Here is how Microsoft describes the issue in the hotfix KB article: [...]
Performance Related Fixes in Post-SQL Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 1 Builds
Posted on: December 6, 2012 1:41 pm
As you may be aware if you have been reading my blogs or books over the years, I am a pretty strong advocate of staying current with both SQL Server Service Packs and SQL Server Cumulative Updates. This is also something that SQLskills recommends on our customer engagements. Despite this, it is still quite common [...]
Top 10 Learning Resources for Accidental DBAs
Posted on: December 3, 2012 11:57 am
So what should you do if you are an “accidental DBA”, who ends up dealing with SQL Server in some capacity on a regular basis without the benefit of any training or experience? What if you are what I like to call a “captive DBA”, because you must install, maintain, and support some other Microsoft [...]
How to Create SQL Server Agent Alerts for Critical Errors
Posted on: September 27, 2012 3:33 pm
One necessary part of being a responsible DBA is to try to configure your SQL Server instances in such a manner so they will be as reliable as possible. This begins with how you initially install and configure the operating system and SQL Server, and what you do over time to maintain and monitor your [...]
Hardware 101 Presentation in Bellevue, WA – August 14, 2012
Posted on: August 15, 2012 2:10 am
I recently had the opportunity to give a one hour presentation called Hardware 101: An Introduction to Database Hardware during the evening, after a full day of SQLskills Immersion Event 2 (IE2) training. Even though it was an evening event, after almost 10 hours of intense training that day, nearly all of the students stayed [...]
How to Obtain and Install SQL Server Service Packs and Cumulative Updates
Posted on: June 19, 2012 6:38 pm
If you are in charge of one or more SQL Server instances, whether they are on your laptop, or a large Production data center, you should be aware of how SQL Server updates and fixes are released, and how you can obtain them from Microsoft. First, a few definitions: RTM means Release to Manufacturing. It [...]
How to Perform a Rolling Edition Upgrade While Using Database Mirroring
Posted on: June 7, 2012 4:45 pm
Imagine that you are using synchronous database mirroring with SQL Server 2005, SQL Server 2008, SQL Server 2008 R2 or SQL Server 2012 Standard Edition, but you want to upgrade the instances on both sides of the mirroring partnership to SQL Server Enterprise Edition so that you can take advantage of some of the valuable [...]
Recommended Intel Processors For SQL Server 2012 OLTP Workloads
Posted on: May 24, 2012 5:45 pm
If you are in the process of evaluating and selecting the components for a new database server to run an OLTP workload on SQL Server 2012 Enterprise Edition, you have several initial choices that you have to make as a part of the decision process. First you have to decide whether you want to go [...]
