Very interesting article.

I want to add my voice to those urging caution with regard to relying on order being forced by a clustered index. According to the SQL standard, the only way to enforce order is with ORDER BY.

The problem with relying on a clustered index is that it isn't supported: no matter how many times you have tested it, it is not guaranteed to work, and data corruption introduced by a few pages not being in the order in which you expect them is likely to be both subtle and really difficult to fix. I can only imagine trying to diagnose the problem... it makes me queasy just thinking about it.

I will consider using the ORDER BY method, which seems to me to be innovative and safe code.