A common issue I've run into while helping with SQL Server Failover Cluster (FCI) installations is the failure of the Network Name . In the following post I'll discuss a bit of background, the common root cause, and how to resolve it. Background The SQL...

I was working on an index build issue for an 80 CPU system and kept seeing that only 64 CPUs were getting used. I had carefully studied sys . dm_os_spinlock_stats and sys . dm_os_wait_stats along with performance counters, memory usage pattern, and I...

The performance counters exposed by SQL Server are invaluable tools for monitoring various aspects of the instance health. The counter data is exposed as a shared memory object for the windows performance monitoring tools to query. It is also available...

When installing SQL 2008 on a newer OS or a machine that has .NET Framework 4.0, you can encounter errors if the SQL installation media is running from a UNC path. The application log can throw an error such as the one below:   Log Name:     ...

Well-constructed indexes can greatly improve read performance in SQL server, but they can be costly to maintain.   There’s the obvious cost of additional time for your periodic index maintenance (rebuilds, reorganization and updating statistics)...