Top 10 Mistakes When Building and Maintaining a Database

Building and maintain a SQL Server database environment takes a lot of work. There are many things to consider when you are designing, supporting and troubleshooting your environment. This article identifies a top ten list of mistakes, or things that sometimes are overlooked when supporting a database environment.


http://www.databasejournal.com/features/mssql/article.php/3906986/Top-10-Mistakes-When-Building-and-Maintaining-a-Database.htm

Partition offset and allocation unit size of a disk for SQL Server

SQL Server performance is dependent on the server resources available and disk performance is probably the most important resource.  To maximize disk performance for SQL Server, I've always been told that the drive's partition offset must be set to 32K and the allocation unit size set to 64K for partitions that hold data and 8K for partitions that hold logs.  How do I find out the allocation unit size and partition offset for my drives?.


http://www.mssqltips.com/tip.asp?tip=2119

How Old Are Your Database Statistics?

Unlike fine wine, database statistics do not improve with age. I recently helped out with a client who was having issues with poor query performance on a SQL Server 2005 instance on very good hardware. After having them run my standard SQL Server 2005 Diagnostic Information queries, nothing glaringly obvious was jumping out at me. Sure, there were a couple of missing indexes that needed to be added, but overall query performance was still pretty bad. The server as a whole was not under obvious CPU, memory, or IO pressure.


http://www.sqlservercentral.com/blogs/glennberry/archive/2010/8/30/how-old-are-your-database-statistics_3F00_.aspx

Restoring Exchange Server 2010 using Windows Server Backup

In my last article we discussed how to benefit from the built-in windows server backup feature of Windows 2008 and 2008 R2 and perform healthy backups of your Microsoft Exchange databases for free, without the need for any 3rd party tool. Today, we are going to go over the restore process by looking at two different situations; the first one is when we have experienced a complete loss of one database, and the second is when we need to recover just a single item from a mailbox.


http://www.simple-talk.com/sysadmin/exchange/restoring-exchange-server-2010-using-windows-server-backup/?utm_source=simpletalkExchange&utm_medium=email-sysadmin&utm_content=Restoring-20100706&utm_campaign=Exchange

Backing up Exchange 2010 For Free

It's hardly surprising that many SysAdmins are willing to pay over the odds for sophisticated backup solutions which they don't necessarily need, just to make sure their data is safe ASAP. Thankfully, Antoine Khater is here to give you a short and sweet walkthrough on how to keep your Exchange 2010 Server backed up for free. And the best news? You've already got everything you need.


http://www.simple-talk.com/content/article.aspx?article=1040

High Performance Storage Systems for SQL Server

Rod Colledge turns his pessimistic mindset to storage systems, and describes the best way to configure the storage systems of SQL Servers for both performance and reliability. Even Rod gets a glint in his eye when he then goes on to describe the dazzling speed of solid-state storage, though he is quick to identify the risks.


http://www.simple-talk.com/sql/performance/high-performance-storage-systems-for-sql-server/

Reliable Storage Systems for SQL Server

By validating the IO path before commissioning the production database system, and performing ongoing validation through page checksums and DBCC checks, you can hopefully avoid data corruption altogether, or at least nip it in the bud. If corruption occurs, then you have to take the right decisions fast to deal with it. Rod Colledge explains how a pessimistic mindset can be an advantage


http://www.simple-talk.com/content/article.aspx?article=1027