SQL Server Performance Tuning Expert - SQL Authority with Pinal Dave

Is your SQL Server running slow and you want to speed it up without sharing server credentials? In my Comprehensive Database Performance Health Check, we can work together remotely and resolve your biggest performance troublemakers in less than 4 hours.

Once you learn my business secrets, you will fix the majority of problems in the future.

Have you ever opened any PowerPoint deck when you face SQL Server Performance Tuning emergencies? SQL Server Performance Tuning Practical Workshop is my MOST popular training with no PowerPoint presentations and 100% practical demonstrations.

Essentially I share my business secrets to optimize SQL Server performance.

An Index Reduces Performance of SELECT Queries (Video)
3 Common Mistakes to Kill SQL Server Performance (Video)
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For SQL Server Emergency Help, you can reach out to me at pinal@sqlauthority.com with words URGENT in the email subject line for other services mention “Comprehensive Database Performance Health Check“.

Mar11

Comparison – Understanding Tables Between Oracle and SQL Server

Pinal Dave

SQL Tips and Tricks

Oracle, SQL Server

Oracle has a Heap-organized table which SQL Server calls “Heap”
Oracle’s “Clustered” tables are called “Indexed Views” in SQL Server
Both Oracle and SQL Server have “Partition” & “Temporary” tables
Oracle’s “External” tables are called “Linked Servers” in SQL Server.
Oracle’s “Object” table is called “Table Type” in SQL Server.
Oracle’s “Index-organized” tables are referred to as a “Clustered index” in SQL Server.
Oracle does not have an equivalent/term for SQL Server’s In-Memory OLTP table
And Oracle’s “Hybrid columnar” compressed tables are called “Column store clustered index” in SQL Server.

Mar10

SQL SERVER – The NOLOCK Question – Notes from the Field #117

Pinal Dave

SQL Tips and Tricks

Notes from the Field, SQL Server, SQL Server Security, SQL Statistics

[Note from Pinal]: This is a 117th episode of Notes from the Field series. Everytime I go to do performance tuning consultancy, one thing annoys me and makes me angry. The usage of NOLOCK hint. I think without any argument, this is one of the most abused query hint in the SQL Server universe. Lots of people treat NOLOCK as a silver bullet of performance tuning and that is unfortunate. There is a special purpose of how NOLOCK should be used and what is the end goal of it.

In this episode of the Notes from the Field series database expert Stuart Ainsworth explains about NOLOCK and its best practices. Trust me, you do not want to overuse NOLOCK hint as it can just impact your database integrity negatively.

Mar9

SQL SERVER – ApexSQL Generate – SQL Server Test Data Generation

Pinal Dave

SQL

ApexSQL, SQL Server, SQL Utility

No Comments

ApexSQL Generate is a test data generation tool for SQL Server. In this article, we’ll introduce the tools’ core features, describe the main types of generators, walk you through an example and, finally, cover some advanced features.

Mar8

SQL SERVER – syspolicy_purge_history job failing step: Erase Phantom System Health Records

Pinal Dave

SQL Tips and Tricks

SQL Error Messages, SQL Server, SQL Server Management Studio

Getting back to consulting mode has got my newer clients and bigger challenges. Not only that I am seeing interests for some of the greatest and latest versions, but some clients are sitting on an older version of SQL Server requiring some serious help for trivial issues. One of my clients has asked to consult for a quick error message troubleshooting in the recent past. Since it was an interesting one about syspolicy_purge_history job, I am sharing it via the blog.

Mar7

SQL SERVER – Setup Closed with Exit Code 0x80004005

Pinal Dave

SQL Tips and Tricks

SQL Error Messages, SQL Server

Recently I was trying to help one of my clients to install Service Pack 3 for SQL Server 2008 R2 instance. Nothing was coming up when we were hitting setup.exe. I looked into my own blog and found Installation Log Summary File Location – 2012 – 2008 R2. But there was no file getting generated. I looked around of MSDN and found: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/database-engine/install-windows/view-and-read-sql-server-setup-log-files?redirectedfrom=MSDN&view=sql-server-ver15. The reason was there was exit code 0x80004005.

Mar6

Interview Question of the Week #061 – How to Retrieve SQL Server Configuration?

Pinal Dave

SQL Interview Questions and Answers

SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Server Configuration

I have observed this question in the interview question few days ago. I had a fun time to see candidates failing to answer this question. The most common answer candidate gave us was that they will right click on the server and see the properties. Well, that option will not give all the details which actual question intended. Let us see the question:

Question: What is the best way to see all the options set for your SQL Server programmatically?

Answer:

Mar5

SQL SERVER – Exception Code c0000005 While Starting SQL Service

Pinal Dave

SQL Tips and Tricks

SQL Error Messages, SQL Server

No Comments

Sometimes I get to see very weird errors by my blog readers and I have no clue about it. Getting a picture about what has happened in the past gives some hint about the solution. This post is a result of once such interaction, where we will see about Exception Code c0000005.

Pinal Dave is an SQL Server Performance Tuning Expert and independent consultant with over 24 years of hands-on experience. He holds a Masters of Science degree and numerous database certifications.

Pinal has authored 14 SQL Server database books and 104 Pluralsight courses. To freely share his knowledge and help others build their expertise, Pinal has also written more than 5,800 database tech articles on his blog at https://blog.sqlauthority.com.

Pinal is an experienced and dedicated professional with a deep commitment to flawless customer service. If you need help with any SQL Server Performance Tuning Issues, please feel free to reach out at pinal@sqlauthority.com.

Pinal is also a CrossFit Level 1 Trainer (CF-L1) and CrossFit Level 2 Trainer (CF-L2).

Nupur Dave is a social media enthusiast and an independent consultant. She primarily focuses on the database domain, helping clients build short and long-term multi-channel campaigns to drive leads for their sales pipeline.