Microsoft® SQL Server 2012 Unleashed

Using FILESTREAM Storage

FILESTREAM storage, introduced in SQL Server 2008, helps to solve the issues with storing unstructured data in SQL Server by integrating the SQL Server Database Engine with the NTFS file system for storing unstructured data such as documents and images on the file system with a pointer to the data in the database. The file pointer is implemented in SQL Server as a varbinary(max) column, and the actual data is stored in files in the file system.

In addition to enabling client applications to leverage the rich NTFS streaming APIs and the performance of the file system for storing and retrieving unstructured data, other advantages of FILESTREAM storage include the following:

You are able to use T-SQL statements to insert, ...