is the mdf actually in that location on your computer?

you'd probably do better to check out a windows c# programming book / forum, this is more an application question than a sql server question.

I'm at a bit of a loss to know exactly what you're asking. The maint plans are for making database and database transaction log backups - you must know what...

off the top of my head I'd suspect that you can't create the entire exec string during execution, you must create the entire string before the exec statement and then...

shrinking a mdf file can have serious detrimental effects on your database, if you must shrink the file you should rebuild all your indexes afterwards to get the best chance...

typically your account will have the correct permissions, the sql service accounts do not. This is pretty basic stuff, have you considered a microsoft training course?

you might also want to reviit your data structures, I generally take a pretty dim view of massive numbers of joins in queries, you just know as data grows this...

sorry Jeff I have to disagree, even if the clustered index is on an indentity column then the clustered index is actually the entire table, regardless of the index being...

or you might be using navision !!

ah well at least I'm not the only one who encounters poor servers setups and databases! Still I make my living mainly from performance tuning so i shouldn't comlain!

this may have no relevance but if you're running SSMS from a client have you service packed the client tools on the workstation? It seems most patch their servers but...

if you script out the proc from both databases are the set options the same either side? ansi nulls and quoted identifier changes can cause havoc with the query plans.

are...

I wasn't having a go it's just that I can't believe that a production database wouldn't have an update stats job run every day( night / quiet period / whatever...

I'd suggest you buy the sql 2000 performance tuning manual - sorry not got isbn to hand.

I'd also recommend Idera SQL Diagnostic Manager

is this a test? Surely you'd run this yourself through profiler etc.and see what happens?