Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Data and Backup Compression

Microsoft SQL Server 2008 introduces two new compression features (available in Enterprise and Developer editions) that are of interest to users with large databases. Data compression applies to individual tables and indexes within a database and comes in two options: ROW and PAGE. Backup compression is a new option when backing up a database to external storage. Both compression techniques can be used to reduce the amount of online storage required for databases and their backups.