>>>>>>>Hi,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>I'm working on a system where the user wants to scan documents and store them in a database. I'm guessing at this point that scanning will be to a TIF or JPG, but am wondering if they may be able to scan to a PDF. What would be the best field type to store these scans?
>>>>>>
>>>>>>You have a few options.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>1. Only store a path to the file in SQL Server (this is the same suggestion as using VFP tables)
>>>>>>
>>>>>>2. Use VARBINARY(max) field
>>>>>>
>>>>>>3. Use new (SQL Server 2008) FileStream option.
>>>>>
>>>>>Thanks. Which option would you recommend?
>>>>
>>>>It all depends on the requirements. The first option is the easiest to implement and it requires less storage in the database, but it adds burden on supporting / managing files in the file system.
>>>>
>>>>For SQL 2008 I'd recommend the option 3, although I personally haven't worked with it.
>>>
>>>Same here - I would go with 1 or 3 (I haven't tried 3 yet) - but you sure don't want to use option 2.
>>
>>Thanks Viv,
>>
>>what's the problem with VARBINARY(max)?
>
>It *does* work but it takes up a lot of space to do it & it's not real fast. I have an app that's been in use for 10 or so years that uses varbinary field to store some images and like I said it works but it sure eats up a lot of disk space....of course diskspace is cheap these days so I dunno maybe it's not such a problem anymore...:)

Thanks, since this is the express version which has a limit of 10GB (I think) I guess it's a good decision not to use it.