Move databases to another server

Question

I have tried moving all databases to another server, but I forgot to change the default database server in Central Administration.

From Googling it, I found out that stsadm or psconfig could help me out here, but I can not figure out how to do this.

I was thinking, "What would happen if I ran the Configuration Wizard, detached from the farm, and then reattached to the existing farm?" Wouldn't that just sort it out for me?

Answer 1

Here are the instructions for moving the databases for:

• Sharepoint 2007
• SharePoint 2010

Also, it is a Best Practice to use SQL Aliases when referencing any instance of SQL server from a SharePoint farm. Doing so makes all future database moves a great deal easier.

Answer 2

It might get you connected to the Config database on the new server, but all the other databases would still be wrong.

The technet article Move all databases (SharePoint Server 2010) suggests that you create an SQL alias pointing to the new database server after making sure you got permissions set up correctly

Answer 3

SQL 2012 brings a new option to the table regarding SQL Aliases for SP2010 & SP2013. If you are using Always-on Availabily Groups (AP) in SQL 2013, you get a SQL listener that does the same function as as the SQL Alaise. AG gives you automatic db failover for your Sp farm. Issue is if you use AG with a SQL alaise you have a single poing of failure so your DB won't automatically failover.

So the big reason to use SQL Aliases for me in the past was to allow me to split my database servers when 1 became the bottleneck. The goodness with AG outweighs this option to improve performance especially as if i'm using AG I probably have suffliecient resources as this is planned upfront.

http://blog.sharepointsite.co.uk/2013/01/create-sql-server-aliases-using.html