Microsoft has recently released the licensing overview for SQL Server 2012. A few things has changes from SQL Server 2008, and I will just give a brief overview over these changes.
CPU vs core
The first major change in my opinion is the change from CPU socket licensing to per-core based. This eliminates the possibility to save some licensing money by buying 6, 8 or 12 core cpu’s for the large enterprices. The price will change so the conversion from cpu to core is 1/4. So if one cpu license today costs 100 (an arbitrary number), the new core license will cost 25 per core, but with a minimum need of 4 cores licensed, giving a total of 100.
An 8 core cpu will cost 200, and a 12 core will cost 300. So for those that spend some money purchasing one 8- or 12-core processor rather than 2 quad core cpus to save money on SQL Server licence, this has now changed!
For those (And I hope that’s not too many of you) still running on dual core servers, the prise will remain the same as today.
Microsoft calls this licensing model for “computing power based”. The core-based licensing will be sold in 2-core packs.
Editions
There has also been a change in the available editions. I have put together a little comparision table:
| SQL Server 2008 | SQL Server 2012 | Notes | |
| Express | x | x | The express edition will still be available for free. |
| Developer | x | x | Developer edition will still be available for non-production use. |
| Workgroup | x | Workgroup edition will no longer be available. | |
| Small business | x | The small business edition will no longer be available. | |
| Web | x | ( x ) | The web edition will still be available, but only via SPLA (Service Provider License Agreement). |
| Standard | x | x | The standard edition will still be available. It will be available for both core-based and cal-based licensing. |
| Business Intelligence | x | SQL Server 2012 comes with a new edition called Business Intelligence. This is only available in server+cal based licensing. | |
| Enterprise | x | x | The enterprise edition will still be available, and only under core-based licensing. |
| Datacenter | x | The datacenter edition will no longer be available. |
So the three main editions will be Standard, Business Intelligence and Enterprise. The list of features available in the different edition, has not yet been released by Microsoft, but I will keep an eye out for it, and post a link when it has arrived.
I won’t go further into details of the licensing here, but take a look at the Licensing FAQ document released by Microsoft.
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