Renaming sa account

Question

Hi all,

I am trying to rename sa account for security purpose so I just want to make sure that is it safe to rename sa account in sql server 2008 RTM.. Did anyone face any issue after renaming it in the clustered environment.. Please provide your opinions..

Answer 1

Hi,

Renaming the SA account has been supported since SQL 2005 as far as I can remember. The only thing I would suggest is that you rename the SA account back to SA if you ever do an in-place upgrade. I don't know of any issues with doing this in a cluster and I would not expect any as sa is disabled in Windows authentication mode.

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/psssql/archive/2008/09/10/upgrade-for-sql-server-2008-can-fail-if-you-have-renamed-the-sa-account.aspx

https://connect.microsoft.com/SQLServer/feedback/details/364566/upgrade-to-sql-2008-from-a-prior-sql-version-fails-if-you-have-rename-the-sa-account

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Answer 2

Hello,

The only issue I know about renaming the sa account is the following support article:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968829

You may face issues when upgrading the instance.  
  
Hope this helps.

Regards,
Alberto Morillo
SQLCoffee.com