I subscribe to CodeProject's newsletter and "product information" emails. Today I received an interesting missive with the headline: "Introducing the new DB2 Express-C". And I noted the "no charge edition" limits you 2 (dual core) processors, 4GB ram limit but with unlimited database size and number and unlimited users.

SQL Server 2005 Express is limited to one CPU and 1GB of ram with a max database size of 4GB. Hmm... I'll bite. I want to know more.

A little exploration reveals a nice article on the wiki about leveraging your MySQL skills. And there seems to be ample information on using DB2 with .NET.

Having never used DB2, I'm completely unaware of what I'm getting myself into, but I'm seriously considering diving into this latest addition to the free, and increasingly capable, database engines.

So I'm downloading now and I'll give it a whirl and report what I find back here. No promises on when.

 Followup - Who am I kidding. The install is HUGE and I have had no time to eval this thing. Toss another distraction overboard.