I am doing an automated installation of SQL Server 2008 R2. I have a new VMware guest with Windows 2008 R2 and ran the SQL Server 2008 R2 setup to create a configuration file. I am only installing the database engine and the Management tools.
During the setup process when it asked for accounts, I entered AD accounts created specifically for the Database and SQL Agent services. They are AD accounts that only have the Domain Users group membership.
I am invoking the automated setup by using the following command:
Setup.exe /SQLSVCPASSWORD="************" /AGTSVCPASSWORD="************" /SAPWD="*************" /ConfigurationFile=MyConfigurationFile.INI
When calling the automated script, everything works fine up until the portion where we specify the service accounts for the database and SQL agent. I receive an error for both accounts as follows:
The specified credentials for the SQL Server service are not valid. To continue, provide a valid account and password for the SQL Server service.
I am positive that the passwords that I am passing into the setup.exe application are correct. I can install using the manual process and those usernames/passwords just fine.
This appears to be a bug and I have seen plenty pf posts that you can use local, localystem or network service accounts and it will work find. However. best practices dictates that I create separate domain accounts that only have domain users group membership.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
Best Answer
Seems like if your password has two $$ in it, it will cause the password to be saved with only 1 $ in the configuraiton.ini file. Make sure there is only 1 $ in the password if you can. That was my solution for this issue.