SQL Server 2000 Workgroup Edition and Great Plains

[disintegration]

Hi, I'm curious if going with the Workgroup Edition would preclude us from any functionality in Great Plains.

Thank you.

-----
Space travel's in my blood.

 

[RWahlert]

By workgroup edition do you mean MSDE? If so, then you are limited to a 2 Gig database size and somewhere around 5 users. Some of the more advanced funstionality of GP may be lost, but not to much.

 

[VictoriaYudin]

Here is a link that lists all the SQL 2000 Editions:

http://www.microsoft.com/sql/evaluation/overview/default.mspx

Based on what this says (specifically "Workgroup Edition is ideal for the small organization for non-mission-critical ... solutions.") and the fact that I don't recall ever seeing any mention of it anywhere in GP documentation, I have a feeling that it would not be supported by Microsoft for GP. But that's just a gut feeling, if you really wanted to make sure, I would start a support incident with Microsoft.

 

[disintegration]

Actually, the GP requirements list Workgroup Edition as supported. The only differences seem to be in some of the backend DBA-type analysis services and Workgroup is limited to 2 processors instead of 4 with Standard. Otherwise, they both can only have a 1TB database and can only address 2GB of RAM.

I just don't know enough about SQL Server to ascertain if not having some of those analysis services would impair Great Plains. My conversations with a consultant concluded that they don't. But, the licensing is tricky with SQL Server Workgroup Edition, in that the CALs can only be used for the Workgroup Edition. In the event you needed to implement Standard for whatever reason, you wouldn't be able to reuse the CALs.

I think we're opting for Standard just to limit potential surprises down the road, although I'm relatively certain Workgroup suffices in a small business atmosphere where no DBA is present and you just need to get Great Plains deployed.

-----
Space travel's in my blood.

 

[VictoriaYudin]

Can you point me to a link or tell me where you say GP requirements with Workgroup supported? (I am not doubting you, I would just like to have it for future reference.)

If that is the case, you should be pretty safe with Workgroup. If it's enough of a savings over Standard, I would definitely contact Microsoft GP support and ask about it. Or, if this is a presale question and you're not a customer yet, your GP partner should be able to get this kind of question answered by support.

 

[disintegration]

I have an updated version of the recommendations document. It doesn't appear to be posted on the Microsoft Great Plains site, strangely. Here it is.

-----
Space travel's in my blood.

 

[VictoriaYudin]

Thanks - I must have missed that, I am sure I have seen that document before. Based on this, I would think you'd be completely safe going with Workgroup Edition for what GP needs. The analysis services are useful once in a while for troubleshooting purposes and tracking stuff, but from my experience, most users never use them, especially for smaller GP installations.

Do you think you would need to implement Standard for some other reason down the road? How much different is the pricing?