How-to Snippet: SQL Server 2005 Internal error. Buffer provided to read column value is too small.

Some of you may have come across this error message in SQL Server 2005. SQL Server 2005: “Internal error. Buffer provided to read column value is too small. Run DBCC CHECKDB to check for any corruption”. If you run a DBCC CHECKDB, it will return without any errors.

When do you see the error in SQL Server 2005?

When you do a SELECT…INTO a temporary table. Example: SELECT * INTO #mytable FROM dbo.datatable

Note: where #mytable is the temporary table and dbo.datatable is the table in the database you are working on.

How do you resolve the error?

This was issued Microsoft:
This issue has been fixed in the Cumulative update package 2 for SQL Server 2005 Service Pack 2 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/936305) as part of SQL Hotfix 50001299. Please install the more recent Cumulative update package 4 for SQL Server 2005 Service Pack 2 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/941450) which contains this fix and more.