title: Concentrating multiple MS SQL Servers into one
body: <p>I have an interesting SQL challenge. I have multiple satellite (potentially in the 100s) of MS SQL express Servers that I need to concentrate into one central SQL Server. The satellite servers are basically logging transactions that occur, basically the usage of a material at a particular time. The central SQL Server will be used for reporting summary reports (e.g the amount of material used per day etc), rather than holding the full data set from each machine. I have a couple of ideas in mind of how to do this (using linked servers on the central server with a view on each satellite server is one, and a SQL task that periodically refreshes the data ). What I am not sure is how would that scale up when I am using multiple satellite servers, what would be the best solution performance wise ?</p>