Categories: SQL Server

SQL Server 2016 service pack 1 is here!

SQL Server 2016 service pack 1 has been released and it is a mayor one! You can download it here.
Why, you ask, is it so important? Because a lot of Enterprise Edition database engine features are now available in the other editions as well. In other words, you can now enable compression and use columnstore indexes in Standard Edition. This is great news for existing customers who can now implement faster databases for no extra cost.

This is fantastic news, of course. A bit less fantastic news was that Power BI Desktop on premises probably won’t be for SQL Server 2016, but rather for SQL Server vNext. I can’t deny that I’m quite disappointed. More information can be found here. But enough about the bad news. SQL Server 2016 SP1 is not only great for customers that don’t have Enterprise Edition, but there are also some enhancements and bug fixes:

the list with release information
there are some performance improvements for SSAS
SSRS has some nice enhancements as well. They also have a blog post about the future of SharePoint integration.

The official announcements:

In short, SQL Server 2016 SP1 is a great opportunity for people who have already SQL Server 2016 but don’t have Enterprise Edition installed. Furthermore, it’s a good reason to upgrade to SQL Server 2016 if you haven’t already.

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Koen Verbeeck

Koen Verbeeck is a Microsoft Business Intelligence consultant at AE, helping clients to get insight in their data. Koen has a comprehensive knowledge of the SQL Server BI stack, with a particular love for Integration Services. He's also a speaker at various conferences.