Restore DB — Error RESTORE HEADERONLY is terminating abnormally.

Question

I have taken backup of SQL Server 2008 DB on server, and download them to local environment.

I am trying to restore that database and it is keep on giving me following error.

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An exception occurred while executing a Transact-SQL statement or batch. (Microsoft.SqlServer.ConnectionInfo)

------------------------------ ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

The media family on device 'C:\go4sharepoint_1384_8481.bak' is incorrectly formed. SQL Server cannot process this media family. RESTORE HEADERONLY is terminating abnormally. (Microsoft SQL Server, Error: 3241)

For help, click: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink?ProdName=Microsoft+SQL+Server&ProdVer=09.00.4053&EvtSrc=MSSQLServer&EvtID=3241&LinkId=20476

I have tried to create a temp DB on server and tried to restore the same backup file and that works. I have also tried no. of times downloading file from server to local pc using different options on Filezila (Auto, Binary)

But its not working. After that I tried to execute following command on server.

BACKUP DATABASE go4sharepoint_1384_8481  TO DISK=' C:\HostingSpaces\dbname_jun14_2010_new.bak' with FORMAT 

It is giving me following error:

Msg 3201, Level 16, State 1, Line 1 Cannot open backup device 'c:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL10.SQLEXPRESS\MSSQL\Backup\ C:\HostingSpaces\dbname_jun14_2010_new.bak'. Operating system error 123(The filename, directory name, or volume label syntax is incorrect.). Msg 3013, Level 16, State 1, Line 1 BACKUP DATABASE is terminating abnormally.

After researching I found the following 2 useful links:

1. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/290787
2. http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/sqlsetupandupgrade/thread/4d5836f6-be65-47a1-ad5d-c81caaf1044f

But I am still not able to restore Database correctly.

Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks.

Answer 1

You can check out this blog post. It had solved my problem.

http://dotnetguts.blogspot.com/2010/06/restore-failed-for-server-restore.html

Select @@Version
It had given me following output Microsoft SQL Server 2005 - 9.00.4053.00 (Intel X86) May 26 2009 14:24:20 Copyright (c) 1988-2005 Microsoft Corporation Express Edition on Windows NT 6.0 (Build 6002: Service Pack 2)

You will need to re-install to a new named instance to ensure that you are using the new SQL Server version.