I have a database with several partitioned tables on MS SQL Server 2005 Enterprise, and I have to restore this DB on MS SQL Server 2012 Standard. Since Standard doesn't support partitioning - it's a bit complicated to restore all the data to the new server. I have to find a simplest and quickest solution.
My first idea is to remove partitions on 2005 DB, then make a backup and restore it on SQL Server 2012. But my database is large and to merge it's partitioned data takes couple of hours for just one table.
The quickest way, from my point of view, would be the data transfer from old to new DB, but it will probably also take too much time.
Please share your ideas - may be I'm not aware of some features in 2012 that might be helpful.