Conclusion
Databases are very powerful!
- anything you can do with a plain file containing a matrix of values you can do with a database
- databases can do it all and then some more
- you do not have to know it all to use a subset of what a database offers
- everything has been optimized in countless ways
- as the complexity of relationships within your data grows, a database becomes more advantageous
- as the amount of your data grows, a database becomes relatively more efficient vs. a plain file
- using "stored procedures" you can analyze your data from within the database for amazing performance gains
- databases enable advanced data-mining methods
- a slave server can give you local and synced access to a remote database
- think of databases as magic black-boxes which do your bidding better than you know how
- many more reasons too...
Want to learn more?
The best way is to use a database for your next project. After an initial learning curve, things should get really easy. See mysql.com for a great online reference.