This post really should have a topic of "Pet Peeve" but I really didn't want to sound quite so negative.
It seems like almost every time I see a clever solution in a newsgroup response, or in a blog post, about how to extract some very useful troubleshooting information using the Dynamic Management Views, someone will ask for an equivalent query in SQL Server 2000. It just happened again as I was doing a google search and came across a post by Kevin Kline right here on sqlblog about using the new metadata to get information about space usage in tempdb. It was actually referring to a query developed by Aaron Bertrand, who also posts here. Someone asked if there was a way to do the same thing in SQL 2005, but we assume they meant SQL 2000. Our own Adam Machanic responded that the CROSS APPLY operator was not available in SQL 2000, but that is the least of our worries. The query refers to seven different Dynamic Management Objects (6 views and a function), most of which have no equivalent in SQL Server 2000.
It just seems that some people seem to think that anything we can do in one version should be doable in a previous version. If that were true, why would you upgrade? Do you only upgrade for performance benefits? I don't think so.
In my opinion, the BEST SQL Server 2005 feature is the new system metadata. It is absolutely worth the price of admission. There are so many things that you couldn't even begin to find out about with the metadata from SQL 2000, and the only way to get that level of internal detail is to UPGRADE!
If you're running SQL 2005, the Dynamic Management Objects can provide hours and hours of fun and exciting explorations!
~Kalen