Question : Backing up SQL Server 2000 database on 2008

Hi,

We have a database now hosted on a SQL Server 2008 R2 instance. Currently the compatibility mode of this database is 100. Every month, a copy of this database is backed up, compressed and securely sent to a third party. Before this month, this database was hosted on a SQL Server 2000 instance and everything worked smoothly. Now there is a problem because the third party only have SQL Server 2000. If I set the compatibility mode of this database to 80 and back it up, will this produce a backup file that is backward compatible with SQL Server 2000 (i.e. that SQL Server 2000 can restore?) or do later versions of SQL Server always produce backup files that are incompatible with previous versions irrespective of the database compatibility level?

Thanks in advance.

Answer : Backing up SQL Server 2000 database on 2008

No, you cannot do this. I'm pretty sure that no SQL backup can be restored to any earlier version. If they just want to see the data they could possibly install SQL 2008 R2 Express edition? The compatibility mode does not affect which versions of the SQL engine a database can be restored to.

If that is not an option you will need to look at other technique e.g. replication or use a SSIS package to transfer the data.