1 (small) loop (but not row-by-row), using temporary lookup table, can handle variable lengths

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Create table #HexToAlpha

(

recordid dec(5,0) identity(1,1)

, hexstring varchar(20)

, alphastring varchar(10)

)

Insert into #HexToAlpha values('416E6E61', '')

Insert into #HexToAlpha values('416E6E656C6F75697361', '')

Insert into #HexToAlpha values('416E746F696E65747465', '')

Insert into #HexToAlpha values('4265726E616465747465', ''

Insert into #HexToAlpha values('4265726E617264696E65', ''

) --etc...

create table #NHC (numbr smallint identity(0,1), hex char(2), chr varchar(1))

insert into #NHC (chr) select top 256 null from sysobjects

declare @hexes char(16)

set @hexes = '0123456789ABCDEF'

update #NHC set hex = substring(@hexes,numbr/16+1,1)+ substring(@hexes, numbr- (numbr/16 * 16)+1, 1), chr=char(numbr)

while exists (select * from #hextoalpha where len(hexstring) len(alphastring)*2)

update #hextoalpha set alphastring= alphastring +

(select chr from #NHC where substring(hexstring, len(alphastring)*2 +1,2) = hex )

where len(hexstring) len(alphastring)*2

drop table #NHC

select * from #hextoalpha