Instant File Initialization Speeds SQL Server

What is Instant File Initialization?

In my first two examples, before instance file initialization was turned on, the reason it took so long for the database to be created, or the database to be restored (before a database can be restored, its space must first be pre-allocated, much like creating a new database), SQL Server had to go to every page in the 50 GB database and zero each one of them out. It can take a lot of time for SQL Server to go to every 8K page in a file (especially very large files) and physically zero out each page. When instant file initialization is turned on, SQL Server doesn’t have to zero out every 8K page that has been allocated. Instead, the space is just allocated to SQL Server by the operating system in one fell swoop, which is a very quick process, potentially saving you a great deal of time.


Read more: http://www.bradmcgehee.com/2010/07/instant-file-initialization-speeds-sql-server