Multiple Files for database

So, due to some oversights in planning, I've got a 200gb database that
is working from 1 file. Performance is remarkeably good(fast server &
disks), but we can't defrag the drive since there's not 200gb of free
space. Regardless of that problem, it seems it would be wise to have
this database spread across multiple files. Is there any way to do
this? I realize I can add files to the existing database, but how do I
get the first file to shrink?Ben Hanson wrote:
> So, due to some oversights in planning, I've got a 200gb database that
> is working from 1 file. Performance is remarkeably good(fast server &
> disks), but we can't defrag the drive since there's not 200gb of free
> space. Regardless of that problem, it seems it would be wise to have
> this database spread across multiple files. Is there any way to do
> this? I realize I can add files to the existing database, but how do
> I get the first file to shrink?
Is the file full of data or is there empty space? If there's sufficient
empty space, you can use DBCC SHRINKFILE to recover disk space. It may
take some time to run, so best to do this off-hours. If you just need to
move tables, you can create the new database file and recreate the
clustered indexes on the new data file for those tables you want to
move.
What's your drive array setup?
David Gugick
Quest Software
www.imceda.com
www.quest.com