Chapter 2. Building Your SQL Server
Unless you're walking into an environment in which SQL Server 2008 is already in use, your first task will be installing a new SQL Server instance or upgrading an existing SQL Server 2005 (or earlier) instance to SQL Server 2008. In this chapter, I explore the process of installing SQL Server and performing the initial configuration tasks to get your database server up and running quickly.
Installing SQL Server 2008
Before you begin the installation of SQL Server 2008, you should ensure that the server you intend to use meets the minimum hardware and software requirements I discuss in Chapter 1. You also need a copy of the SQL Server 2008 installation package for the edition you want to install.
Before beginning the installation process, you should make several important configuration decisions. In the remainder of this section, I walk you through those decisions and then explain how to install SQL Server 2008 on your server.
Choosing between default and named instances
SQL Server allows you to install multiple instances on the same server. You can think of each instance as an individual "copy" of SQL Server running on the same server. Why might you want to run more than one copy of SQL Server on the same server?
You may install different versions of SQL Server side by side on the same server using multiple instances. For example, if your organization is planning to upgrade to SQL Server 2008 but you want to approach the upgrade in a piecemeal fashion, ...
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