SCCM 2012 SQL Database - should I co-locate or not?

[wat4lunch]

Hi all,

 

First post so first wanted to commend you on a fantastic site - has been a great source of knowledge learning how to use SCCM 2007. So much so i'm now responsible for our 2012 migration :-)

 

Having some issues deciding on the best method for the SQL side of things, as Microsoft don't seem to have a best practise for this.

 

Was wondering how people have decided on whether to co-locate the SQL database on the site server or not.

 

We have probably 2,500 clients, but initially I wanted to have it on a remote SQL Cluster so we can get some resiliency for the DB (We'll be waiting for SP1 for the site install)

 

However, after a bit more reading co-locating may be the best bet;

 

- Less server overhead

- Better performance (found this here suggesting a cluster can cause performance degradation)

- Simpler implementation

- Mirroring of DBs isn't supported so DB backup would have to be managed by SCCM site server anyway

 

On the other hand, if we use a SQL 2012 Cluster we could use the Always on feature (if supported) and use Hyper-V 2012 replicas for the site server) to give us a tasty resiliant solution......waiting to hear from Microsoft if this would work.

 

Does anyone have any experience with weighing this up or advice for why we should co-locate?

 

Thanks!