I have shown how you can find out if SQL Server eliminates partitions in your queries. Most of the time SQL Server is doing great job in partition elimination and it is scanning or seeking only partitions that could potentially yield rows satisfying the WHERE, IN or other row eliminating clauses. In spite of that you should still check the query plans of your queries against partitioned tables if you suspect the performance may be or is an issue. You should be aware that SQL Server is employing both the static partition elimination when the query is optimized and dynamic partition elimination when the choice of scanned and skipped partitions is made at the query execution time. ...

As promised way back in August, here is the first installment of a series of blogs on database performance from the application point of view. Complex screens can cause database performance problems when each control (grid, list box, etc) on the screen...

Question: How can SQL Server 2005 help me evaluate and manage indexes? (1) How can I find out whether my indexes are useful? How are they used? (2) Do I have any tables or indexes that are not used (or rarely) (3) What is the cost of index maintenance...