For practicing programming and administration it's not going to make a great deal of difference whether you install a default or a named instance. Why not keep it simple and...

Enterprise manager is one of the components that you can install from the SQL Server 2000 CD.

Thanks for the tip Dan.

I've just finished reading Michael Otey's book "Microsoft SQL Server 2008 new Features", and on page 58 he states:-

"Some of the clustering-specific improvements in SQL Server...

Any additional logging options available in the 3rd party app?

There may be an option somewhere to turn on more verbose logging perhaps?

Failing that, I think SQL Profiler is going to...

Hmm never had to do this myself, but you might try:-

1) Shutdown the instance in question

2) Take a file-system copy of all the MDFs and LDFs (including the system databases

3)...

It's definitely Visual Studio and not BIDS? (Business Intelligence Design Studio) which is the cut-down version of VS which ships with SQL Server?

Either way you should be able to uninstall...

The only two options at the global level are Windows Authentication or Mixed Mode (Windows and SQL Server). Unfortunately there is no SQL Server only authentication.

If you have existing domain...

The backup time will not so much be dependent upon the amount of RAM in your system but more by:-

(a) the I\O available on the disk where the database is...

No that's fine, you won't need Access on the server in question.

Use Access from your PC to create (or if you don't have Access, have the user create for you)...

I have Visio Pro 2002, and that does a nice job of building an ERD for you from an existing database.

You could try using the SSIS Import \ Export Wizard.

In Management Studio right click on the database in question, "Tasks", "Export Data".

In the resulting wizard check that the source server...

Yes, that query returns a more comprehensive result.

I was trying to find a way to use a DMV rather than querying a system table.

You should be able to do this by running the setup.exe from the command line and adding the relevant switches. For example "TARGETCOMPUTER=" and "INSTALLASDATADIR".

For even more granular control you...

Have never seen this myself, but if an executable it being renamed, could this be the result of some kind of Virus Scanning software if it suspects (rightly or wrongly)...

Hmmm how about...

select count(*) from sys.dm_exec_requests where db_name(database_id) = 'MyDatabaseName'