A frequent question I see on the various news groups goes something like this one: "Is it possible to download SQL Server 2005 for practice? Is there like student edition available for nominal fee? Subscribing to MSDN is very expensive for an individual."

Actually you can get all you need for "free.^*" I'll point you at the most current stuff. As a reminder, this is unsupported beta software. Do not install it on a machine that you care much about being able to not uninstall it cleanly from (think FDISK, ok). It is best to install it to a virtual host (like VirtualPC), or make a really good backup first. Why? Uninstalling this software -- while not hard -- is order of component removal sensitive as talked about here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=66120BE8-826A-482A-8264-B1836F28FD79&displaylang=en

First, make sure you are running on an OS and hardware configuration that meets the minimum requirements:

• Supported Operating Systems: Windows 2000 Advanced Server, Windows 2000 Professional Edition , Windows 2000 Server, Windows 2000 Service Pack 4, Windows Server 2003, Windows XP Professional Edition , Windows XP Service Pack 1. Note that Windows XP Home, Windows NT, Windows Me and Windows 9x are not supported at this time.
• Intel Pentium III or compatible 550-megahertz (MHz) or higher processor (1 gigahertz or more recommended). Certain non-Intel processors like the Transmeta and some odd-ball AMD chips have been problematic in the past.
• 256 megabytes (MB) of RAM (512 MB or more recommended for sure.)
• 405 MB of available hard disk space.

With that said, I normally recommend installing these bits in this order:

1. The .NET framework version 2.0.40903 from http://download.microsoft.com/download/9/A/4/9A47D72B-9D98-46CC-87F3-B92E97888E4B/dotnetfx.exe
2. The SQL Server 2005 Express Edition (SSX) bits, version 9.0.0981 from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=66120BE8-826A-482A-8264-B1836F28FD79&displaylang=en
3. Express Manager (XM) from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=8F92556A-6C3B-47D2-9929-ECDC5A4D25AE&displaylang=en
4. The SQL Server 2005 Books online from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=2adbc1a8-ae5c-497d-b584-eab6719300cd&displaylang=en. The downloads are at the bottom of that page.
5. You may also want to download and install the AdventuresWorks database to work with. There's a long posting in blog covering that. See http://sqljunkies.com/WebLog/ktegels/articles/installawdbssx.aspx

While I think using the December CTP is "the way" to go for most folks, you may and to use the less current but more stable Beta two bits. Those are at:

• The .NET framework version 2.0.40607 from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=B7ADC595-717C-4EF7-817B-BDEFD6947019&displaylang=en
• The SQL Server 2005 Express Edition (SSX) bits, version 9.0.852 from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=62B348BB-0458-4203-BB03-8BE49E16E6CD&displaylang=en
• The SQL Server 2005 Books online from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=2adbc1a8-ae5c-497d-b584-eab6719300cd&displaylang=en. The downloads are at the bottom of that page.
• Sorry, there's no XM for that version (see http://sqljunkies.com/WebLog/ktegels/archive/2004/09/30/ssxgui20040930.aspx), but you can use QARA instead. You can get that from http://www.tegels.org/qara/.

Note that this version is pretty much stand alone. If you want/need a rich "developer's environment," you may want to look at using one of the Visual Studio Express products instead (see http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/express/.) They ship with and install their own version of the .NET runtime and SSX, so there's no need to download and install them separately.

^* Note that SSX isn't the full version of SQL Server 2005 and those differences are covered in the Express White Paper at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/dnsse/html/sseoverview.asp. That said, SSX is a great way to get started. By free, I mean that there's no charge to download or license to buy.

Original Link  |  Comments

A frequent question I see on the various news groups goes something like this one: "Is it possible to download SQL Server 2005 for practice? Is there like student edition available for nominal fee? Subscribing to MSDN is very expensive for an individual."

Actually you can get all you need for "free.^*" I'll point you at the most current stuff. As a reminder, this is unsupported beta software. Do not install it on a machine that you care much about being able to not uninstall it cleanly from (think FDISK, ok). It is best to install it to a virtual host (like VirtualPC), or make a really good backup first. Why? Uninstalling this software -- while not hard -- is order of component removal sensitive as talked about here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=08215D3F-9A1D-483F-8E21-A2EE19936899&displaylang=en

First, make sure you are running on an OS and hardware configuration that meets the minimum requirements:

• Supported Operating Systems: Windows 2000 Advanced Server, Windows 2000 Professional Edition , Windows 2000 Server, Windows 2000 Service Pack 4, Windows Server 2003, Windows XP Professional Edition , Windows XP Service Pack 1. Note that Windows XP Home, Windows NT, Windows Me and Windows 9x are not supported at this time.
• Intel Pentium III or compatible 550-megahertz (MHz) or higher processor (1 gigahertz or more recommended). Certain non-Intel processors like the Transmeta and some odd-ball AMD chips have been problematic in the past.
• 256 megabytes (MB) of RAM (512 MB or more recommended for sure.)
• 405 MB of available hard disk space.

With that said, I normally recommend installing these bits in this order:

1. The .NET framework version 2.0.50110.27 from http://download.microsoft.com/download/e/a/7/ea749a11-f09f-4e9b-8d04-36763a71de58/dotnetfx.exe
2. The SQL Server 2005 Express Edition (SSX) bits, version 9.0.1090 from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=08215D3F-9A1D-483F-8E21-A2EE19936899&displaylang=en
3. Express Manager (XM) from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=67079BB3-4FD4-4638-B923-A13741179B98&displaylang=en
4. The SQL Server 2005 Books online from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=2adbc1a8-ae5c-497d-b584-eab6719300cd&DisplayLang=en The downloads are at the bottom of that page.
5. You may also want to download and install the AdventuresWorks database to work with. There's a long posting in blog covering that. See http://sqljunkies.com/WebLog/ktegels/articles/installawdbssx.aspx

While I think using the February CTP is "the way" to go for most folks, you may and to use the less current but more stable Beta two bits. Those are at:

• The .NET framework version 2.0.40607 from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=B7ADC595-717C-4EF7-817B-BDEFD6947019&displaylang=en
• The SQL Server 2005 Express Edition (SSX) bits, version 9.0.852 from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=62B348BB-0458-4203-BB03-8BE49E16E6CD&displaylang=en
• The SQL Server 2005 Books online from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=2adbc1a8-ae5c-497d-b584-eab6719300cd&displaylang=en. The downloads are at the bottom of that page.
• Sorry, there's no XM for that version (see http://sqljunkies.com/WebLog/ktegels/archive/2004/09/30/ssxgui20040930.aspx), but you can use QARA instead. You can get that from http://www.tegels.org/qara/.

Note that this version is pretty much stand alone. If you want/need a rich "developer's environment," you may want to look at using one of the Visual Studio Express products instead (see http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/express/.) They ship with and install their own version of the .NET runtime and SSX, so there's no need to download and install them separately.

^* Note that SSX isn't the full version of SQL Server 2005 and those differences are covered in the Express White Paper at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/dnsse/html/sseoverview.asp. That said, SSX is a great way to get started. By free, I mean that there's no charge to download or license to buy.

Original Link  |  Comments