Windows 2012 upgrade

[former_member787462]

Dear All,

We are running on SAP ECC 6.0 Ehp4 on Windows 2003 OS (with MSCS cluster environment) and DB is running on MS SQL 2008.

We are planning to upgrade our windows from 2003 to 2012 R2 version & MSSQL from 2008 to MSSQL 2012 ( On Windows 2012 R2 OS , only supported DB is MSSQL 2012 as of now. Here i am talking only about MSSQL DB). We followed the below SAP notes.

1651862 - Release planning for Microsoft SQL Server 2012
1732161 - SAP Systems on Windows Server 2012 (R2)
1676665 - Setting up Microsoft SQL Server 2012
1651862 - Release planning for Microsoft SQL Server 2012 

But, we need somemore information on what risks we have when we directly upgrading OS & DB from Win 2003 & MSSQL 2008 to Win 2012 R2 & MSSSQL 2012.

1) Is this upgrade is possible? Like directly upgrading OS & DB from Win 2003 & MSSQL 2008 to Win 2012 R2 & MSSSQL 2012.( I mean , i wanted to upgrade DB & OS as well at the same time).

2) what kind of risks we will be facing?

3) Any other Limitations? on Windows 2012 R2 OS & MSSQL 2012 DB?

Kindly share us the idea or views if you have done these kind of projects already or any inputs are very much appreciated.

Best regards,
Manoj K

[Reagan]

Hello

Have you read this SAP note ?

1494740 - SAP system migration from Windows 2003 to 2008 (R2) 64-bit

There is a possibility to upgrade from Windows 2003 to Windows 2012. You need to first upgrade the system to Windows Server 2008 R2 and then to Windows Server 2012. Here is what the note says.

You cannot use this procedure to upgrade to Windows Server 2012 (or higher)! In this case, you have to perform an in-place upgrade to Windows Server 2008 R2 first and then afterwards to Windows Server 2012 (or higher).

You should first get the OS upgraded to Windows Server 2012 and then upgrade MSSQL to 2012.

As long as you have the supported kernel and also the minimum BASIS level for 2012 you should be alright.

Regards

RB

[Matt_Fraser]

This is where it gets confusing.  In Note 1476239 (SAP system migration to Windows 2008/2008 R2) it states:

Microsoft does not support the upgrade of a Windows operating system if any software - including SAP software - is installed that is not part of the Windows operating system itself.

It goes on to say that a system copy should therefore be used instead.

That said, I have done in-place OS/DB upgrades with SAP installed, successfully, but only on sandbox systems, not production.  Production has always been a system copy when an OS upgrade is required (and we're going through this process now, migrating from Windows 2003 to Windows 2012 R2, but I did just recently upgrade in place a sandbox system with ERP 6.0 EhP4 on SQL 2005 / Windows 2003 to first Windows 2008 R2, then SQL Server 2012, then Windows 2012 R2).

--Matt

[former_member787462]

Dear Matt & RB,

Thanks for the inputs.

Below is my understanding.

1) Directly upgrading from Win 2003 to 2012 is not possible.

2) In order to upgrade your OS from Win 2003 to 2012 below are the conflicts.

     a) First point. MSSQL 2012 DB is only supported with only when your SAP is running on Windows 2008 or Win 2012 OS. For upgrading window 2012 , SQL server 2012 is prerequisites (Only SQL Server 2012 is supported productively on Windows Server 2012 (R2), which means, in order to connect SAP systems our SQL server must be at SQL server 2012)

     b) In order to support & connect to MSSQL 2012 , your SAP must be running at minimum required SAP version(Since we are in ECC 6.0 Ehp4/NW 7.01 SP6 - in our case upgrading SP level to its latest in SMP for NW 7.01 is required).

     c) For upgrading the SQL server 2012 , windows 2008 or 2012 is a prerequisites (SQL Server 2012 is only supported on Windows Server 2008 or higher. Any SAP system running on an older Windows version must be migrated to Windows Server 2008 or higher to run on SQL Server 2012.)

3) I have a question for you Matt,

     - You have told me that, "You should first get the OS upgraded to Windows Server 2012 and then upgrade MSSQL to 2012." - No, this is not possible, looking at a) & c) in my option, there is no way you can upgrade the Windows 2012 R2 OS first, cuz, in order to upgrade your OS, your DB must be running on MSSQL 2012(correct me if i am wrong). In this case, first DB should be migrated from MSSQL 2008 to MSSQL 2012, then you can have one more Windows 2012 OS box, on top it you can run the SAP installation.

Here my question, how can we do this? is there any best approach we can follow to do this? I have following concerns.

1) First i will have 2 new Windows OS 2012 boxes (1 for SAP , 1 for DB).

2) I will migrate/copy/restore my MSSQL DB from MSSQL 2008 to MSSQL 2012. Here, what kind of options are possible on moving content from 2008 db to 2012 db new box, i am asking this question since i am not a DBA expert here. Please suggest us, what are all the possible options thinking in downtime perspective.( Is it possible to do the In place upgrade? or what other best possible options,  And also i do not want to touch my existing SAP system productions path.)

3) Once you moved the content from 2008 db to 2012 db, still i have my 1 day business data stored in my MSSQL 2008 DB.., if i restore or copy this from lower version 2008  to higher version 2012, do you see any inconsistency? please advise?

And also please advise other possible options on upgrading 2003 to 2012 OS & 2008 to 2012 DB

Appreciate your efforts.

best regards,

Manoj K

[Matt_Fraser]

Actually, what I said was install a fresh Windows 2012 R2 system, and then install a fresh SQL Server 2012 DBMS on it, then restore your database to this system and run the target system copy procedure from SWPM.

If you must do an in-place upgrade (which is not supported for production systems, generally), then you are right, you will need to do the OS upgrade in two steps, and do the DBMS upgrade in between those two steps (i.e., first upgrade Windows 2003 to Windows 2008 (R2), then upgrade SQL Server 2005 to SQL Server 2012, then upgrade Windows 2008 to Windows 2012 R2).

Also, as you've indicated, you will need to ensure that your Basis support pack level is high enough to support SQL Server 2012, and that you have the right kernel to support Windows 2012 R2.  You can do the SQL Server upgrade and then apply the Basis support packs after the fact, or you can apply the support packs before the upgrade.  The kernel switch should occur roughly at the same time as the Windows upgrade.

However, I still recommend that you not do in-place upgrades, but instead do fresh installs.  Since you indicated (I think) that you have two new Windows 2012 boxes, this should be easy.  Just install SQL Server 2012 onto the database instance box, then restore from a backup of your database to that instance, then run the system copy target system procedure against it.

You do not need to do anything special with the database backup before restoring it to SQL Server 2012.  You can restore a backup made from SQL 2005 to SQL 2012 just fine.  By default it will be in "SQL 2005 compatibility mode" when you first restore it, but the SWPM system copy procedure will change that to SQL 2012 compatibility mode automatically.

Also, have a look at this blog entry I wrote some months ago, before Windows 2012 R2 was fully supported by SAP, about my experience doing an in-place upgrade just like you are doing:  .