Did the recent purchase of MySQL by Sun and the subsequent buggy releases kill the MySQL brand?
I whole heartedly embraced MySQL when it first came out as I used to be a
Having worked with both, I have to say that the limitations and/or bugs in MySQL were a big turn off for me... I don't like PHP, and while I respect the open source community for their advances with these two technologies I just can't see the elegance in the way either of them have been put together. But don't let my personal taste sway your judgement against MySQL.
I do all of my prototyping in SQL Server Express and most of my clients use full blown SQL Server 2005. The ease of transition from one to the other makes it a no brainer for me - I can take anything I wrote for SQL Server Express and put it straight in without worrying that the syntax might be different. The two limitations don't even really get in the way in a dev environment - it's only when you come to production that they would tend to be a problem.
For me, SQL Server wins the argument hands down.