Posted by Erland Sommarskog on 11/05/07 22:49

aj (ronald@mcdonalds.com) writes:
> SQL Server 2005 SP2
>
> Are there any guidelines/rules of thumb as to the max number
> of SQL Server instances on a single 64-bit server?

This page in Books Online
ms-help://MS.SQLCC.v9/MS.SQLSVR.v9.en/instsql9/html/13e95046-0e76-4604-b561-d1a74dd824d7.htm
says 50 instances per server, except for failover cluster where the
number is 25.

Given that instances will compete about memory of each, I would not really
consider putting 50 instances on the same box, unless it has lotttttts of
memory, say 64 GB, and each instance has modest requirements, so that I
could set the max server memory for each instance to 1GB or so.

--
Erland Sommarskog, SQL Server MVP, esquel@sommarskog.se

Books Online for SQL Server 2005 at
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/sql/2005/downloads/books.mspx
Books Online for SQL Server 2000 at
http://www.microsoft.com/sql/prodinfo/previousversions/books.mspx

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