I agree with Jeff. Allowing a customer or vendor to use xp_cmdshell on your system is opening a security hole you can never completely close. If what they...

For educational purposes can you give me a rough outline of how to safely give access to xp_cmdshell and bulk administer rights as well as how to handle the proxy...

In SQL Server 2000 it used to be best practice to set the owner of all databases to the sa account.

With the introduction of database ownership chains this...

You may want to look at FineBuild. The latest version for SQL Server 2008 now also supports cluster installs.

I saw a table once from Microsoft that said you needed to reserve 6Gb for Windows ...on a 64GB server. The same table showed (I think) that about 1.5...

Doing a windows defrag will have zero impact on SQL Server index fragmentation.

The index defrag makes sure the extents used for a table are in ascending order within the database...

Did you use the correct install media for your SQL install? The SQL 2005 install media is split across 2 CDs - one for client components and one for...

Have you found the point in the setup log where the problem occurs. Very often the first error is many kb away from the bottom of the log, so...

The SQL VSS service can be used for a number of things. Simply having VSS writer active will not in itself cause problems with your backup chain.

One typical use...

Although there is no desperate need to change the account for SQL Browser, I can understand concerns about it using local service because this is a high-privilege account.

Each site will...

IMHO the cloud is going to be the biggest change in the way we use SQL Server since the original Sybase port. I think it is likely that by...

You can change the SQL Browser account after the install, or if you are doing a command-line install you can use the (undocumented) /BROWSERSVCUSERNAME and /BROWSERSVCPASSWORD parameters.

You may be interested in SQL FineBuild. It does a lot of post-install configuration and is designed to leave you with a SQL instance that uses minimum permissions required...

You always have an option.

At the very minimum, you should do a risk assessment of an in-place upgrade. ...

SSRS is not cluster aware. Further, you cannot install a SSRS instance with the same name as the SQL DB instance, it must have a different name.

The /ACTION=InstallFailoverCluster process...