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SQL Server 2008 Upgrade Services

In-Place & Side-by-Side Migration Solutions and Support

Are your critical databases currently running on SQL Server 2008?

Mainstream support for SQL Server 2008 ended in July 2014, and the extended support period ends on July 19th, 2019. Do you have a plan in place?

If your database operates past SQL Server 2008’s end of life, you run the risk of encountering a number of major problems that can affect your organization. These include:

  • The inability to meet regulatory compliance standards.
  • Missing out on critical security updates to protect against zero-day exploits and data breaches.
  • No software support for bugs and errors.
  • The potential for unresolvable outages that could result in critical data loss.
  • Higher maintenance costs due to maintaining legacy servers, firewalls, and intrusion systems.

Supports upgrade sql server 2008 to:

  • SQL Server 2008 SP4 or later.
  • SQL Server 2008 R2 SP3 or later
  • SQL Server 2012 SP2 or later
  • SQL Server 2014
  • SQL Server 2016 (requires Windows Server 2012)
  • SQL Server 2017

Datavail’s expert database administrators have upgraded hundreds of instances and over 10,000 SQL Server databases. Our team can augment your team, own specific areas of the upgrade project, or drive the entire initiative. We support both in-place and side-by-side migration upgrades and follow Microsoft’s framework to ensure all upgrades are completed according to precise specifications.

To do this, we utilize a three-stage approach: Discover, Plan & Target, and Upgrade.

Phase 1: Discover

Datavail’s Discovery process allows our database administrators to orient to your environment, reducing the need for your team to do all the heavy lifting. To develop an upgrade plan that reduces downtime and the possibility of any issues, we start by surveying your current landscape. This includes:

  • Run MAP or SQL Power Doc to gather the SQL Server instances and details.
  • Run Upgrade Advisor to check for any issues in your databases that may interfere with the upgrade process so that you can fix them.
  • Complete the Datavail upgrading planning checklist to collect key stats, logs, and performance metrics.
Phase 2: Plan and Target

Datavail’s planning process starts with evaluating your current database environment. Do you have ETL, data integration, or other system utilities that would be disrupted when you upgrade? Does your server operating system support the new SQL version, or would you need to update other systems before this process takes place? How will you migrate data and cut over to the new system? All of these and more will be considered as we formulate an upgrade plan, which includes:

  • Deciding on the ideal target infrastructure: local, cloud, hybrid, virtualization/containerization.
  • Define security requirements.
  • Determining whether in-place or side-by-side upgrade is right for your specific needs.
  • Plotting out a rollback strategy in the event of any issues.
  • Upgrade sequencing: Order, grouping, and downtime tolerance.
  • Considerations for consolidation.
  • Confirm alignment with app and dev teams for remediation.
Phase 3: Upgrade

With a comprehensive and codified plan in place, Datavail’s expert DBAs can begin the process of upgrading SQL Server 2008 to the latest iteration. These steps include:

  • Upgrading the development environment.
  • QAing and testing the development upgrades.
  • Application and development code remediation.
  • Learning and updating or modifying the automation processes and scripts if needed.
  • Upgrading the QA, testing, and staging environments in sequence.
  • Upgrading the production environments and providing 24×7 staffing to minimize business impact and cost.

Datavail’s experts DBAs stick around long after the upgrade is completed, providing additional assistance in the implementation of new features and performance improvements to help improve database availability, reliability, and recoverability.

Is your organization ready to upgrade SQL Server 2008 to the newest version? Fill out the form to the right and one of our expert database administrators and upgrade specialists will contact you to get started.

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Call us at: 877-634-9222

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