Can't connect to SQL Server 2008 Express on PC without a network connection

Question

I've just installed SQL Server 2008 Express on a PC running Win7 64-bit. The machine is a stand-alone one, that does not connect to a network, nor to the Internet. I am installing SQL Server as I want to install an app I wrote that will use the database.

I tried connecting to the SQL Server using Query Express (from http://www.albahari.com/queryexpress.aspx), because it's small, free and a good way to access the database (the Express editions of SQL Server don't include SSMS, so I can't use that).

However, I can't connect. I get the famous error...

A network-related or instance-specific error occurred while establishing a connection to SQL Server. The server was not found or was not accessible. Verify that the instance name is correct and that SQL Server is configured to allow remote connections. (provider: Named Pipes Provider, error: 40 - Could not open a connection to SQL Server)

There is a wealth of info about this error, but it all seems to apply to the full version, not the Express version, and generally involves starting up SSMS, which isn't installed.

I've been through all of the suggestions I can find, including enabling Named Pipes and TCP/IP and adding inbound and outbound rules to the windows firewall to allow connections to and from sqlserver.exe and also via port 1433, but this didn't help. I restarted the service many times, so that wasn't it.

I wrote a small console application that tries to connect to the local SQL Server and list the tables, and this failed with the same exception, so it's not Query Express that's the problem.

I suspect that it may be related to the fact that the machine does not have any networking set up at all, but I don't know.

Anyone any ideas? Thx.

Answer 1

You should use SSMS. you can get this by downloading the full version of SQL server 2008. The full version has express on it as well as the SSMS.