TheSQLGuru (8/22/2013)
3) You are very likely NOT getting in-place updates on your first update. Both fields are NULLABLE and as such when you give them a value for that update they become LARGER.
Yes, if the table is compressed that would be true. But else not. Fixed-length data types like tinyint and datetime take up the same amount of space, no matter they are NULL or not.
[font="Times New Roman"]Erland Sommarskog, SQL Server MVP, www.sommarskog.se[/font]