Help : Can I Upgrade SQL Edition without reinstall?
Posted by blakhani on June 3, 2011
And answer is “it depends”. Well, I have seen posts in forum asking steps to upgrade SQL Standard to SQL Enterprise OR SQL Developer to SQL Standard etc. So I am writing this blog to bring some clarity in steps to be performed.
First of all, refer below matrix to know if in place edition upgrade is possible or not.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms143393.aspx (SQL Server 2008 R2)
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms143393(v=SQL.100).aspx (SQL Server 2008)
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms143393(v=SQL.90).aspx (SQL Server 2005)
Above links are for version upgrade as well as edition upgrade. Now, if matrix says you can upgrade from edition X to edition Y then steps are pretty simple.
For SQL 2008 and SQL 2008 R2:
- Run setup.exe from media.
- If you have SQL already installed then you can also launch “Installation Center” by going to Start->Programs ->Microsoft SQL Server 2008[R2]->Configuration Tools-> SQL Server Installation Center[(64-bit)].
- You would get below screen titled “SQL Server Installation Center”
- Go to “Maintenance” and click on “Edition Upgrade”
- Go through the Wizard and choose the Instance you want to upgrade.
It would hardly take few minutes to upgrade and I have done with many customer.
One question which was asked many times is where the hell is the key which i should enter. If you have media, look for DefaultSetup.ini file and you would find PID there.
For SQL 2005:
I would update this post once I take screenshot from SQL 2005 setup.
Cheers,
Balmukund Lakhani
Help: SQL Server 
Siva said
New blog, Good Initiative. Bookmarked it in my blog. Looking forward for good learning. Best of luck.
blakhani said
Thanks Siva. Nice to see you around.
Vincent said
Hello,
Thank you for your procedure.
I did the update of SQL 2008 R2 SP1 Express Edition with Advanced Services to Standard Edition.
but even after restarting the server, the query “SELECT @ @ VERSION;” tells me that the Express version is still installed.
Can you help me?
please
Vincent
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