Jared Poche explains why the TOP clause is superior to using SET ROWCOUNT:
I was presenting on how to use the TOP clause to break down large operations into short, fast, bite-sized operations. The mechanics are things I learned from writing processes that do garbage collection, backfill new columns, and anonymizing PII data on existing tables. I’ve just posted the slides and example scripts here if you are interested.
ARE THEY THE SAME?
The question was whether the SET ROWCOUNT command would work just the same, and the answer is sometimes yes but largely no.
Read on to see what Jared means.