March 18, 2012 at 9:26 pm
Hi,
Just was wondering if one can install instances different edtitions of SQL Server 2008 R2 (e.g. Enterprise and Standard) on the same server and if there are any licensing gotchas?
Thanks.
March 19, 2012 at 2:05 am
i've done this in the past when consolidating hardware, there are no issues with it as the binary files are installed in different folders, the only limitation we had was the amount of drive letters you can have as each instance had its own drive for system dbs, then tempdb then backups, then user data and finally user logs so could only have up to 4 instances on a server.
as for licensing, when you purchase a higher licence you have downgrade rights, so if you purchase enterprise you can install standard in its place, and if you purchase data centre you can install enterprise or standard in its place. what I would say though is that you have already licenced the server for the higher edition so why not just install the higher edition?
March 19, 2012 at 2:26 am
anthony.green (3/19/2012)
i've done this in the past when consolidating hardware, there are no issues with it as the binary files are installed in different folders, the only limitation we had was the amount of drive letters you can have as each instance had its own drive for system dbs, then tempdb then backups, then user data and finally user logs so could only have up to 4 instances on a server.as for licensing, when you purchase a higher licence you have downgrade rights, so if you purchase enterprise you can install standard in its place, and if you purchase data centre you can install enterprise or standard in its place. what I would say though is that you have already licenced the server for the higher edition so why not just install the higher edition?
We are paying for the licenses every year, so when we plan to consolidate the servers, we want to use Standard edition for distributor instances instead of Enterprise, so to save money.
March 19, 2012 at 2:30 am
how are you licensing the servers? CPU lics or Server&CAL lics?
if CPU then you only need to purchase the amount of Enterprise licences which match the number of CPUs, you dont need to purchase Standard as you get 50instances per server with Enterprise which I have never had more than 4 and only ever heard one person on here who has actually got to 50instances on a server.
March 19, 2012 at 5:54 pm
anthony.green (3/19/2012)
how are you licensing the servers? CPU lics or Server&CAL lics?if CPU then you only need to purchase the amount of Enterprise licences which match the number of CPUs, you dont need to purchase Standard as you get 50instances per server with Enterprise which I have never had more than 4 and only ever heard one person on here who has actually got to 50instances on a server.
Yep, we use CPU licenses. Lets say we have 16 cores on the server. Can we allocate 8 of them to the Enterprise and 8 to the Standard and save on licenses this way?
March 20, 2012 at 2:22 am
Roust_m (3/19/2012)
anthony.green (3/19/2012)
how are you licensing the servers? CPU lics or Server&CAL lics?if CPU then you only need to purchase the amount of Enterprise licences which match the number of CPUs, you dont need to purchase Standard as you get 50instances per server with Enterprise which I have never had more than 4 and only ever heard one person on here who has actually got to 50instances on a server.
Yep, we use CPU licenses. Lets say we have 16 cores on the server. Can we allocate 8 of them to the Enterprise and 8 to the Standard and save on licenses this way?
I may be missing something here but have you actually purchased the CPU licenses? If Yes then you are not going to save anything as you've already paid for them surely? If No then I would say that if you buy an 8-CPU license for Enterprise and 8 for Standard then as long as you limit the CPUs that each instance can use to no more than 8 you won't be breaking the license.
March 20, 2012 at 2:41 am
remember in 2008 you licence the CPU not the CORES, so if you have 16 cores, how is that broke down? 2cpuX8cores or 2cpuX4coresHT or 1cpuX8coresHT etc etc
(note when you upgrade (if you choose) to 2012 you do have to licence CORES not the CPU's)
there is nothing stopping you limiting the CPU's at the instance level
March 20, 2012 at 2:51 am
If I remember correctly, you have to license every processor that the operating system has access to. (That's how it was in previous versions - please correct me if it's changed.) Therefore the only way not to license a processor is to turn it off in the BIOS. It follows, then, that you can't assign some processors to one instance and others to another for licensing purposes.
John
March 20, 2012 at 2:59 am
John is right, the second note in the licencing doc details
For SQL Server running in a physical operating system environment (POSEs), you must license all the physical processors
So goes back to the original point of why bother installing Enterprise and Standard, its licenced for Enterprise so might as well make use of the features even if your not using them.
March 21, 2012 at 12:20 am
John Mitchell-245523 (3/20/2012)
If I remember correctly, you have to license every processor that the operating system has access to. (That's how it was in previous versions - please correct me if it's changed.) Therefore the only way not to license a processor is to turn it off in the BIOS. It follows, then, that you can't assign some processors to one instance and others to another for licensing purposes.John
We havent purchased the licenses, we go on the yearly payment for what we use, so if we cut on licences now, we will have to pay less at the end of the year.
If we licence 8 cores for Enterprise and 8 cores for Standard on a 16 core server, why can't we do this?
We use quad cpu quad core servers btw.
March 21, 2012 at 2:44 am
Roust_m (3/21/2012)
Because when you buy a licence, you buy it for every processor in the computer. Even if you set the affinity mask so that one instance uses half the processors and one uses the other half, you still have to pay for every processor that the operating system has access to. It may not be fair, but it's what you sign up to in the EULA.
John
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