get used to post full ddl and sample data - hard to give correct help without it.

2 possible ways to do it (more exist) - which one is better depends...

I wouldn't call 160 massive and this works for us.

Once all the files have loaded, we then archive the files (just in case) into a zip file and then...

this may help http://download.microsoft.com/download/F/C/C/FCC534B7-90B3-464D-8A24-006DF155F769/Windows%20Embedded%20Server%20and%20Microsoft%20SQL%20Server%20data%20sheet.pdf - your best bet is to contact one of the embedded reselers and ask them about it.

you need to rebuild the index. https://www.sqlservercentral.com/steps/stairway-to-columnstore-indexes-level-8-optimizing-clustered-columnstore-indexes

look at Ola scripts https://ola.hallengren.com/ - will do what you asked (and a lot more if you need)

no difference from a performance point of view - backup and restore is still done on the same server, and copy of bak file still happens between the same servers.

however...

Most was said already - I have gone an extra step with one of our teams and I have DDL triggers that prevent developers from using 3/4 part names in...

To check elapsed timer the developers can implement a timer variable - stop timer, stop timer and then get elapsed time - example https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/api/system.timers.timer?view=netframework-4.8

But timer may not help here depending...

For your needs i would probably stay out of the gaming laptops and go for the more "normal" ones https://www.newegg.com/p/pl?N=100006740%204814%20600337010%20601331008%20601311244%20600488336%20601323887%20601303722%20600004945%20600004946

This one for example looks better than the one you mentioned...

one possible way is to use robocopy - you can set multithread copy (for performance) and you can also set parameters to copy only newer or modified files - you...

Also take in consideration that if the non prod servers have a "free" SQL License on that UAT server  e.g. developer edition or MSDN licensed editions  then whatever data is...

you can't prevent the trigger from executing but you can control what it does by looking at the event data and filtering if the command is a create snapshot one

within...

when using linq using https://www.linqpad.net/ is a must - with it you can see what SQL will be generated

within your c# code you can also see what is the sql...

it is the the user running the sql instance that needs access to the share (or a proxy if enabled and if you are using xp_cmdshell to do the load)

have a look at Dbatools - probably has what you need https://dbatools.io/commands/