Add a SQL Server license to an existing Windows server

Windows

Compute Engine lets you install SQL Server on Windows virtual machines (VM) instances and use pay-as-you-go (PAYG) licenses. This document describes how you can perform the following:

Add SQL Server license metadata to a boot disk
Obtain SQL Server media and install SQL Server
Apply a SQL server product key to a Compute Engine VM instance

Billing

After adding a license string to the Windows VM's boot disk, you are billed according to the pricing of SQL Server images.

Limitations

You can only add PAYG licenses for the following editions of SQL Server:
- SQL Server Web edition
- SQL Server Standard edition
- SQL Server Enterprise edition

Add a SQL Server license

SQL Server license metadata on a boot disk allows Google Cloud to accurately track, bill, and report on SQL Server license usage. This metadata is required when using PAYG SQL Server licenses. Add a SQL Server license to an existing boot disk using the following procedure:

Identify the license you want to add to a VM. For SQL Server, the license needs to match both the version and edition you want to run. For the list of valid SQL Server license strings, see the License strings tab in the operating system details for SQL Server document.
Stop the VM:
```
gcloud compute instances stop VM_NAME
```
Replace VM_NAME with the name of the VM instance to stop.
Identify the boot disk:
```
gcloud compute instances describe VM_NAME
```
Replace VM_NAME with the name of the VM.

Verify that the output is similar to the following:

disks:
- autoDelete: true
  boot: true
  deviceName: BOOT_DISK_NAME
  diskSizeGb: '20'
  guestOsFeatures:
  - type: UEFI_COMPATIBLE
  index: 0
  interface: SCSI
  kind: compute#attachedDisk
  licenses:
  - BOOT_DISK_LICENSE_STRING
  mode: READ_WRITE
  source: https://www.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/PROJECT_NAME/zones/ZONE/disks/BOOT_DISK_NAME
  type: PERSISTENT

Detach the boot disk:
```
gcloud compute instances detach-disk VM_NAME --disk=BOOT_DISK_NAME
```
Replace the following:
- VM_NAME: the name of the VM
- BOOT_DISK_NAME: the name of the boot disk
Clone the boot disk and add the additional license:
```
gcloud compute disks create CLONED_BOOT_DISK_NAME \
  --licenses=SQL_SERVER_LICENSE \
  --source-disk=BOOT_DISK_NAME \
  --source-disk-zone=BOOT_DISK_ZONE \
  --zone=CLONED_BOOT_DISK_ZONE
```
Replace the following:
- CLONED_BOOT_DISK_NAME: the name you want to give the cloned book disk
- SQL_SERVER_LICENSE: the SQL Server license you want to add to the boot disk. For information on SQL Server licenses, see the License tab in section SQL Server on Windows
- BOOT_DISK_NAME: the name of the source boot disk that you want to clone
- BOOT_DISK_ZONE: the zone of the source boot disk
- CLONED_BOOT_DISK_ZONE: the zone in which you want to create the cloned boot disk
Verify that the new disk has the correct license:
```
gcloud compute disks describe CLONED_BOOT_DISK_NAME \
  --zone=CLONED_BOOT_DISK_ZONE
```
Replace the following:
- CLONED_BOOT_DISK_NAME: the name of the cloned book disk
- CLONED_BOOT_DISK_ZONE: the zone of the cloned boot disk
Attach the new disk as the boot disk for the VM instance:
```
gcloud compute instances attach-disk VM_NAME \
  --disk=CLONED_BOOT_DISK_NAME
  --boot
```
Replace the following:
- VM_NAME: the name of the VM instance to which you want to attach the cloned boot disk
- CLONED_BOOT_DISK_NAME: the name of the cloned book disk
Verify that the VM's boot disk is the new cloned disk with SQL Server licensing.
```
gcloud compute instances describe VM_NAME
```
Replace VM_NAME with the name of the VM.
Start the VM instance.
```
gcloud compute instances start VM_NAME
```
Replace VM_NAME with the name of the VM.
(Optional) When you are sure that you don't want to revert back to the earlier boot disk, you can delete the disk.
```
gcloud compute disks delete BOOT_DISK_NAME \
  --zone=BOOT_DISK_ZONE
```
Replace the following:
- BOOT_DISK_NAME: the name of the boot disk that you want to delete
- BOOT_DISK_ZONE: the zone of the boot disk

Obtain the SQL Server media and install SQL Server

To obtain the SQL Server installation media and copy it to a Compute Engine VM boot disk, do the following:

Create a new disk containing the SQL Server installation media using any version of SQL server (for example, 2019 Enterprise):
```
gcloud compute disks create SQL_SERVER_MEDIA_DISK_NAME \
  --image-family=sql-ent-2019-win-2022 \
  --image-project=windows-sql-cloud \
  --zone=SQL_SERVER_ZONE
```
Replace the following:
- SQL_SERVER_MEDIA_DISK_NAME: the name of the SQL Server media disk that you want to create
- SQL_SERVER_ZONE: the zone in which you want to create the SQL Server media disk
Attach the disk to any existing Compute Engine VM instance:
```
gcloud compute instances attach-disk VM_INSTANCE_NAME \
  --disk=SQL_SERVER_MEDIA_DISK_NAME
  --zone=SQL_SERVER_ZONE
```
Replace the following:
- VM_INSTANCE_NAME: the name of the VM instance to which you want to attach the SQL Server media disk
- SQL_SERVER_MEDIA_DISK_NAME: the name of the SQL Server media disk
- SQL_SERVER_ZONE: the zone of the VM instance
After the SQL Server media disk is attached to a VM instance, on your Windows machine, open the Disk Management page to see if the disk has a drive letter assigned to it. If not, right-click on the disk and select Online to bring it online. The SQL Server media disk is now the D: drive on the Disk Management page and in Windows Explorer.
Ensure the boot disk of your VM instance has at least 5 GB of free disk space and copy the SQL Server media to your boot disk:
```
robocopy /mir d:\sql_server_install\ c:\sql_server_install
```
Detach the SQL Server media disk from the VM instance:
```
gcloud compute instances detach-disk VM_INSTANCE_NAME \
  --disk=SQL_SERVER_MEDIA_DISK_NAME
```
Replace the following:
- VM_INSTANCE_NAME: the name of the VM instance you from which you want to detach the SQL Server media disk
- SQL_SERVER_MEDIA_DISK_NAME: the name of the SQL Server media disk that you want to detach from the VM

For more information, see Microsoft SQL Server installation guide.

Apply a SQL server product key to a Compute Engine VM instance

In order to upgrade the SQL Server installation media, you must obtain and apply a new product key to the Compute Engine VM instance on which the SQL Server is installed. To obtain the product key and upgrade the SQL Server installation media, do the following:

Obtain the product key from the SQL Server installation media:
```
C:\> type C:\sql_server_install\x64\DefaultSetup.ini
```
Apply the product key and upgrade the SQL Server installation media. For more information, see Upgrade to a different edition of SQL Server.