Mystery laptop: an update
Never trust the customer We were sure that the server had last service packs applied, that’s the first that we asked of the customer IT, and got a definite answer that “But, of course!”. So we didn’t really think this might be an issue. Then we noticed that SQL Server build number was 1399, while my laptop was running 3042. This reads: customer’s top-notch server is still on SQL Server 2005 RTM, my laptop is on SP2. There may hide the culprit.
So - a lesson learned: check the versions yourself, check them first, no matter what they say to you.
BUT STILL - did SP2 really bring such a huge performance improvement? Any experiences anyone? I’ve found out that there are some improvements with performance, but on such a huge scale? I mean, it is still three times faster on four times weaker hardware. This should call for a 12-fold improvement in certain operations, quite a feat
I look forward to this evening, when we have SP2 upgrade scheduled - I really can’t wait to see if this helps. I hope so, otherwise, we don’t need technical consultants on this project - we need exorcists!

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