Article from Microsoft website

Comparison Between SQL Server 2005 Standard and Enterprise Editions

Today, database professionals need to be able to provide higher levels of data availability than ever before, as database systems are being widely used for critical applications. As service level agreements (SLAs) are becoming stricter in terms of acceptable application down-time, administrators need to have tools that allow them to build robust, reliable, and recoverable systems. This includes not just the tools needed for recovery when a disaster occurs, but also the tools needed to allow continuity of service while necessary system maintenance is performed. In response to these needs, Microsoft has implemented a comprehensive set of availability features in Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition, which provides a highly reliable and available platform for enterprise-class relational database solutions. SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition addresses several availability issues, allowing administrators to perform operations online, to limit the scope of any disaster, and most importantly, to limit or even prevent application downtime when a disaster occurs. http://www.microsoft.com/sql/editions/enterprise/comparison.mspx Please be sure to check or updates or latest information.

SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition Benefits

Allows fast storage querying large amounts of data (> 500GB) Scales as data grows Supports high transactional online transaction processing (OLTP) application Includes always on technologies to ensure business continuity

Application remains online during operating system, hardware, and software upgrades. Fast recovery from human errors. (Human error is identified as the number one cause of downtime.) Minimum downtime during disaster recovery. Zero downtime during maintenance operations.

Offers high performance business intelligence and data warehousing

Common Usage Scenarios

SQL Server 2005 is available in a variety of editions to best match the demands of your applications. Here are a few exclusive usage scenarios that demand SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition:

Mission critical OLTP applications that must scale and remain available Server consolidation Data warehousing Complex analytics and data mining Scale out and drill-through reporting

Choosing the right edition of SQL Server is crucial to the success of your business today and in the future. Here is a summary of the differences between SQL Server 2005 Enterprise and Standard Edition features.

Scalability and Performance Comparison

Feature Number of CPUs Memory Multi-instance support Dynamic address windows extensions (AWE) memory management Table and index partitioning Database snapshots Scalable shared databases Indexed views Parallel index operations Parallel consistency checks (DBCC) Enhanced read-ahead and scan (super scan) SQL Server 2005 Standard Edition 4 OS Maximum 16 SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition 64 OS Maximum 50

High Availability Always On Comparison

Feature Failover clustering Database mirroring Database snapshots Fast recovery Online index operations Online page and file restore Parallel index operations Updateable distributed SQL Server 2005 Standard Edition 2-nodes Only Safety FULL Only SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition Up to 9 nodes All Modes

Feature partitioned views Table and index partitioning

SQL Server 2005 Standard Edition

SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition

Manageability Comparison
Feature Hot-add memory support Mirrored backup media Multi-server administration VIA protocol support SQL Server 2005 Standard Edition SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition

Business Intelligence Comparison

Feature Data mining Parallelism for model processing Parallelism for model prediction Algorithm plug-in API Advanced configuration and tuning options for data mining algorithms Advanced analytics Account intelligence Linked measures and dimensions Perspectives Semi-additive measures Writeback dimensions Scalability and performance Proactive caching SQL Server 2005 Standard Edition SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition

Feature Auto parallel partition processing Partitioned cubes Distributed partitioned cubes Integration services Data mining query transformation Data mining model training destination adapter Fuzzy grouping transformation Fuzzy lookup transformation Term extraction transformation Term lookup transformation Dimension processing destination adapter Partition processing destination adapter Reporting services Data-driven subscriptions Report scale-out deployment Infinite Clickthrough in Ad-hoc Reports

SQL Server 2005 Standard Edition

SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition