DBA on Demand Support

  • I am the only DBA in our organization and we have grown to the point of needing some additional DBA resources but not another full time position. We have budgeted for some on demand type DBA support from an external service provider. We are really more in need of 24/7 support hours for emergencies, service pack installations during non-business hours, and upgrades. We are considering 3 different companies and was wondering if anyone can make any recommendations based on their experiences. The 3 companies are nTirety, SATS, and DBA-In-a-Box. We currently run SQL Server 2008 R2 in our production environment and will be upgrading to SQL Server 2012 in the near future.

  • Sorry to say, I don't know anyone working for any of those three. My experiences with all outsourcing agencies is that the responses you get can be very uneven. I'd make sure you review your SLA with the organization very carefully.

    "The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
    - Theodore Roosevelt

    Author of:
    SQL Server Execution Plans
    SQL Server Query Performance Tuning

  • Personally I would be very wary of letting another DBA administer your environments. How sensitive is your data, how complex is your environments, will it always be the same person(s) as they will need accounts with the relevant privilages.

    You also have no idea how good or bad they may be, would employing a part time DBA not be an option, or a graduate and train them up? A graduates salary would be significantly lower and you could possibly bring them in on a shared role as a developer \ dba.

    MCITP SQL 2005, MCSA SQL 2012

  • Look at RDX also.

    Michael L John
    If you assassinate a DBA, would you pull a trigger?
    To properly post on a forum:
    http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/61537/

  • Michael L John (10/22/2013)


    Look at RDX also.

    I was trying to think of that company. I did meet one of their DBAs last week. He seemed like a competent guy. That doesn't mean they all will be, but they have at least one, which is a positive thing.

    "The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
    - Theodore Roosevelt

    Author of:
    SQL Server Execution Plans
    SQL Server Query Performance Tuning

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