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Even though you are limited to 64GB of RAM per service per instance, you should strongly consider getting a slightly larger amount, such as 72GB or 96GB, so that you can set your Max Server Memory setting to 65536 (which would be 64GB), and still leave plenty of RAM for the operating system. Modern, two-socket servers have 24 memory slots, so they can hold 384GB of RAM with these affordable 16GB DIMMs. Microsoft is essentially limiting you to using about $1000.00 of RAM if you are using SQL Server 2012 Standard Edition. I think that is is a ridiculously low RAM limit, given the fact that DDR3 ECC RAM for servers is currently priced at around $10-$15/GB for 16GB DIMMs. Even if your database server has a much higher amount of RAM than 64GB, it will only be able to use 64GB of RAM for each of these services. The first SQL Server 2012 Standard Edition licensing limit is that you are restricted to 64GB of RAM for the Database Engine and 64GB of RAM for SSAS and SSRS. Despite this, I recognize that some organizations simply cannot afford these extra licensing costs (even though it is still far more affordable than Oracle licensing).
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It has many, many truly compelling features that make it absolutely worth the extra licensing cost compared to SQL Server 2012 Standard Edition. As you might be aware, SQL Server 2012 Standard Edition has some hardware-related licensing limits that I think should be adjusted in light of the capabilities of modern, commodity server hardware.Īs a DBA and consultant, I would like to see everyone running SQL Server 2012 Enterprise Edition.