Okay, I have a client saying “but, really, what are the advantages of SQL Server over Access?”.
I’ve tried to explain, but really she feels that something she can see would be better and easier for her (also better for showing to investors).
So, I was wondering if anyone knew of pages or sites that had tests or whatnot of Acess vs SQL server in terms of speed, concurrent connections, etc.
btw, please don’t plug MySQL, thanx 
Try a search at Microsoft’s support site. They’ve written up a page recommending SQL Server over Access. If the site is a small, non-e-commerce site, then Access could work fine.
But if money is on the line, or if you have a busy site with multiple simultaneous connections, then SQL Server is the right choice.
But again, check Microsoft…I know they have some documentation.
Access is basically meant to be scaled down SQL Server in the MS Office Suite.
Also, point out to your client that SQL Server actually SERVES the data, while in an Access DB, it is a file residing on the hard drive, and you must access it as such (naturally, that method is slower). Besides that, SQL holds more records and a boat-load of more connections.
In short, there’s no reason NOT to use SQL Server. If the site is going to be getting a lot of hits, then it’s worth spending the extra money on a SQL package. It will make things a lot easier in the long run.
Hope this helps.
Access is really the GUI that sit’s on top of the JetSQL engine.
Like mentioned it does NOT serve any data, it just stores it.
An easy way to put it is if you want to go somwhere with a few people a car will do the trick, but if you want to take alot of people somwhere you need a bus (SQL), now you can put a car engine in a bus but it’s not going to get you far and definitly will be the bus that everyone passes at 20km/h honking their horn at.
Check this out -> http://www.geek365.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=71
If the project is a large scale one then Access should not even be considered.
Bottom line to your customer is data is most of everyones business today and if there is a lot of it then don’t trust it to Access. SQL is scalable in a big way vs Access. Plus hit her with the whole data warehousing thing also, you can do a ton of things with SQL that Access will not do.
Also if the data is going to be viewed via a website then SQL can take a ton of hits over Access. I know how you feel trying to explain to a customer why to go this way vs Access
If $$ is not option then SQL is a no brainer.
Just to clarify something, I’m not buying the customer a copy of SQL, we’ve already got several development copies here which will more then suit (since part of the contract is that nobody else is allowed to work on it anyways).
I’m pretty much ready to tell her that SQL is probably the better option but the reality is that if her site doesn’t make it big the speed differences and such are minimal, and the time it takes to switch from Access to SQL is even more so: 2 hours.