Yeah, looks like you're running the release version. Just go here for details. There's also a link to the cumulative updates if you want to try them out.

I don't know anyone having major issues with it. In fact, it seems to have fixed several problems people were having with 2012. I'd say it's been ready since April....

You need to have indexes in place that will give the optimizer something to work with. As it is, the only option it has is to scan the tables.

The differential backup will be used only if you specify it yourself for backups. It won't automatically run unless you set it up. The differential will only backup changes to...

Be sure you test the in-memory stuff on a non-production server. Once you create a database as in-memory, it has to stay that way forever. You don't want to do...

Just disable the service. It's the kind of thing you may want to reenable in the future. Plus, it won't save memory, just storage.

The GUID will fragment a lot more, that's for certain. I'd be inclined to use the three integers. They sound like the natural key anyway. And compound keys are not...

Well, first of all, I'd say that while an identity column does uniquely identify a row, you still should have the business key as a unique constraint on the table....

Read the execution plan to understand how the query optimizer chose to interpret your query.

Then it won't do anything any differently than any other...

So this has nothing to do with the query. It's the settings within SSRS that will allow you to have multiple columns.

Unfortunately, I don't know SSRS well enough to...

How do you mean paging? Data is stored on pages. Do you mean page splits? Timestamp isn't going to lead to page splits unless you've indexed it and then it...

For the general stages, go and look at the error log of a server right after startup. It'll show you a number of processes as each completes so that you...

Yes, have one.

But seriously:

Start with backups. Identify the Recovery Point Objective (RPO). That's the amount of data that the business is willing to lose. They'll say zero, but that's an...

If you know for certain that you're using no other mechanisms that need the SQL Writer service, it can be disabled. That's from the Books Online.