SQL Express Suitable for 'Small Deployment' - What is small?

[Killian]

I'm planning an implementation of Veeam Backup and Recovery on a 3 node failover HyperV Cluster containing around 30 VMs total.

A couple of these VMs have an SQL workload running but nothing too intensive (MIS and SCCM basically).

The deployment manual suggests Express is more than adequate for a 'small' deployment and a little later I'm sure it mentions anything over 500 VM being large. Would you think SQL Express is suitable in my instance? I can't imagine I'd use the SQL Explorer as if there were a problem I'd likely restore the whole Database and then let someone more experienced with SQL than I take over.

Would you advise a 3 node failover cluster with even 50 VMs would be more than well served with SQL Express or shall I just install the full install (as we're education the pricing isn't too significant for a licence)? I don't want the server to be any worse off if we use Express and I believe there are some limits in place around instance size and CPU usage.

If we do go down the route of installing SQL 2016 is there any guidance on best settings to do this? I.e. enabling named pipes, reporting services, etc.

Your advice would be greatly appreciated.

[PTide]

Hi,

I don't want the server to be any worse off if we use Express and I believe there are some limits in place around instance size and CPU usage.

Right, there are limitations in terms of RAM, CPU, database size. Please check this BP article for details.

Thanks