Best practice for running SQL Server reporting services. Should I run on the database or web server?

Question

I am configuring a new environment to run several intranet web applications. I have 2 servers, one will be the SQL Server 2008 server, and the other will be the IIS server. I also need to install SQL Server Reporting Services. I am not sure whether it would be better to run reporting services on the database server, or web server. Is there a best practice for this situation?

Answer 1

Depends...

The reporting services rendering is fairly processor intensive so you need to keep that in mind. Typically if I'm designing a system with heavy load or throughput requirements I place the reporting services instance on its own server. The best practice is really dependent on the complexity of your system.

If a third server is not an option and the two servers you already have are similarly speced I would probably place it on the one with the lowest processor load. If you place the reporting server on the web server make sure that Reporting services uses your dedicated database server for the reporting services meta-data so that you don't have to install the RDBMS on both machines.

You need to keep in mind that if you don't place the reporting server on the same box as SQL server you will need another SQL Server license. The product is only "free" if it is installed on the same machine as SQL.

Answer 2

Hi,

I would run installer on your web server so that the web service components of Reporting Services are installed there.

It is also benificial to configure reporting services with it's own application domain in IIS so that you can tweak the configurations independant of say your other web applications.

When you run through setup using the Reporting Services Configuration Tool, set up the database on your non web server (i.e. dedicated db server). This way all your data processing is handled on one server and all your web processing/data rendering is handled on another.

Hope this is clear and of use but please feel free to pose further questions.

Cheers,John