Shawn, Performance/Coding: "System Performance hardware/support cost" vs "ease of coding (man time cost)" have always been and will be a difficult subject with discussions. It is always shifting in the direction of accepting more computer resource overhead (alwasy becoming cheaper) to the ease of coding. At the moment of not being comfortable with the performance/behavior (Volume Velocity Variety) is is getting attention to do something.         I remember the use of Assembler (like C) vs using Cobol for prggrammers was a similar disussion. Indeed that is of ancient times. The perfomance questions with SAS are covered/part of SAS advanced (coding) learning path. We are on the trail of using Eguide now with te click klik, an other shift.  I know: a/ Eguide is not blocking the old coding habits b/ all other SAs clients are evolving in a menu-style approach (Miner, Information map, Olap Cube studio, DI Studio VA etc) SQL The SAS/access modules are ver well documented. Most people don not review those as they are containing all the technical options and issues needing the technical knowledge and overview of the DBA. Shareread globalread locking commit bulkload all have their advantaqges and trade offs. The default settings and options are chosen for a quick reliable ease start.  See: SAS/ACCESS(R) 9.4 for Relational Databases: Reference, Second Edition (CONNECTION= LIBNAME Option) Reading the MS-SQL specifics of access: SAS/ACCESS(R) 9.4 for Relational Databases: Reference, Second Edition (LIBNAME Statement Specifics for Microsoft SQL Server) you have the dbsliceparm. They are not that different as to ODBC specifics:  SAS/ACCESS(R) 9.4 for Relational Databases: Reference, Second Edition (LIBNAME Statement Specifics for ODBC) Here you have your steroids.... And more stuff  Using explicit SQL pass thru is the sceneario: you are telling you are better in SQL-coding than the menu-driven way. By that it is offering the SQL specifics of the DBMS. Sounds terrible: SQL is not  that standard as expected. SAS is using ANSI-SQL (unless you are going to use the new DS2 features). The specfics of sql pass-thru is giving the option to access information in het DBMS in the MDL domain. (DDL normally restricted for the DBA, DML commonly open for user applications) SAS/ACCESS(R) 9.4 for Relational Databases: Reference, Second Edition   (SQL Pass-Through Facility Specifics for ODBC) Have fun with all of this, Jaap ... View more