You might give RedGate's Prompt a try. Or ApexSQL Edit. They're both built for coding SQL.
Anything more powerful than Notepad will almost certainly cost some system resources, but I can't say I've had it matter for me.
Right now, I'm running SQL Server Dev, the client for Norton AV Enterprise, a few other background/services, Outlook 2003, IE 7, and Management Studio, but not running any local queries or jobs, and I'm at 2% CPU (Pentium D), and 2.5 Gig RAM (with SQL Server taking 1.7 of that) (out of 3.5 Gig available). Management Studio is more resource-hungry than Query Analyzer, and takes longer to fire up, but it's not that big a deal to me.
- Gus "GSquared", RSVP, OODA, MAP, NMVP, FAQ, SAT, SQL, DNA, RNA, UOI, IOU, AM, PM, AD, BC, BCE, USA, UN, CF, ROFL, LOL, ETC
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