Can an MS SQL 2005 backup be restored onto an instance of MS SQL 2008?

Question

Is it possible to restore a backup of a SQL Server 2005 database onto an instance of SQL Server 2008?

I need to rebuild a server as it\'s getting rather crufty, so I pla

Answer 1

Yes, but make sure that ALL of your servers are SQL 2008. If you have development, test, QA or disaster recovery servers, all of them will need to be 2008, since 2005 servers won't be able to restore a 2008 backup.

To prevent the lost-login problem that Ilya mentioned, follow the steps in this knowledge base article. SP_Help_Revlogin will script out your logins, and you can apply that script on the new server. Presto, all your logins are back with the same SIDs and everything.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/246133

(And just for future reference, this is how we upgraded StackOverflow last night, heh.)

http://twitter.com/SuperDalgas/status/976719756