Microsoft SQL Server review
June 28, 2024
Microsoft SQL Server review
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with Microsoft SQL Server
I primarily use Microsoft SQL Server 2019 and 2022 data engine to run commercial workloads of various customers. A frequent configuration use case is the usage of Microsoft SQL Server Always On failover cluster instances to provide high availability and redundancy at the Microsoft SQL Server instance level. In some cases, I also make use of Microsoft SQL Server replication to ensure that a primary (publisher) database is replicated, by using transaction of snapshot replication, to a subscriber SQL instance from which the customer can run various SQL queries for analytical reporting purposes without affecting the SQL production workloads. Another common case where I make use of Microsoft SQL Server is when running hybrid cloud SQL workloads, in which case I combine on-premise SQL Server deployments, Azure VM-based SQL Server deployments and Azure SQL or Azure SQL Managed Instance resources.
Pros
- Always On failover cluster instances for high availability
- Microsoft SQL Server replication for keeping synchronized copy of a database
- Microsoft SQL Server maintenance plans for maintaining integrity and performance of the affected databases
Cons
- Microsoft SQL Server Enterprise edition has a high cost but is the only edition which supports SQL Always On Availability Groups. It would be nice to include this feature in the Standard version.
- Licensing of Microsoft SQL Server is a quite complex matter, it would be good to simplify licensing in the future. For example, per core vs per user CAL licensing, as well as complex licensing scenarios in the Cloud and on Edge locations.
- It would be good to include native tools for converting Oracle, DB2, PostgreSQL and MySQL/MariaDB databases (schema and data) for import into Microsoft SQL Server.
- By introducing Microsoft SQL Server failover clustering, we improved DB availability by 70%, thus increasing operational efficiency by almost 90%.
- By using Microsoft SQL Server replication, we allowed business users to use the replicated databases to run high impact queries without affecting the performance SQL instances.
- By using Microsoft SQL Server maintenance tasks, we reduced the time DBA administrators require for trivial maintenance tasks and increased efficiency of the business by 50%.
Microsoft SQL Server providers a more user friendly experience when it comes to Microsoft SQL Server components management via its unique SQL Server management Studio. It is also a production ready, resilient, highly available and tested database management system (DBMS). The choice of Microsoft SQL Server came out because of the tight integration of Microsoft SQL Server with the remaining core Microsoft products, including Windows Server and Microsoft Dynamics CRM.
Do you think Microsoft SQL Server delivers good value for the price?
Yes
Are you happy with Microsoft SQL Server's feature set?
Yes
Did Microsoft SQL Server live up to sales and marketing promises?
Yes
Did implementation of Microsoft SQL Server go as expected?
Yes
Would you buy Microsoft SQL Server again?
Yes
Comments
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