SELECT * INTO retains ORDER BY in SQL Server 2008 but not 2012

Question

Execute the following SQL in 2008 and 2012. When executed in 2008, the returned result is in its correct sort order. In 2012, the sortorder is not retained.

Is this

Answer 1

First, thanks sgeddes for the explanation, it helped a lot. The thing about defining a table variable or creating a temp table is you have to define it, and if you are going to go through the work of defining it, you might as well do the insert the correct way:

INSERT INTO #Result (col1, col2...)
SELECT Col1, Col2... FROM #MyTable....

In my case, the ORDER BY in the INSERT was dynamic so when I called "SELECT * FROM #Result", the ORDER BY was unknown. My solution was to add a ROW_NUMBER column that I could hardcode into the SELECT when I was getting the data. Yea, I still have to include an ORDER BY, but at least it's static. Here's what I did:

--Insert
SELECT ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY T.SortOrder ASC) AS RowNum, T.*  
INTO #Result 
FROM (SELECT * FROM #MyTable ...) AS T;

--Get data out
SELECT * FROM #Result ORDER BY RowNum;

Hope this helps.