>this is the blog that gives me the impression I have: > >http://www.sqlservercentral.com/blogs/steve_jones/2013/04/25/adding-data-to-filestream-with-t-sql/ > >>When FILESTREAM is used, the files are stored in the file system and table only stores a pointer/reference to it. IOW, if files stored in the table, you are not using FILESTREAM >>> >>>From my reading it seems that the table appears to have the file stored within it, hence the apparent size of the table, but that is just smoke and mirrors.