Importing the database

Back up your source on-premises database using MS SQL Native backup and restore (see Support for native backup and restore in SQL Server). As the result of running that operation, you should have a .bak (backup) file.

Upload the .bak file to and existing transit S3 bucket using the AWS S3 CLI or AWS S3 console. For information on transit S3 buckets, see Protecting data using encryption.

Import the .bak file into a new DB on your target RDS for SQL Server MS SQL instance (for details on types, see Amazon RDS for MySQL instance types):

1. Log into the EC2 instance (on-premises workstation) and open MS SQL Management Studio

2. Connect to the target RDS instance created as prerequisite in step #1. Follow this procedure to connect: Connecting to a DB Instance Running the Microsoft SQL Server Database Engine

3. Start the import (restore) job with a new Structured Query Language (SQL) query (for details on SQL queries, see Introduction to SQL). The target database name must be new (do not use the same name as the database that you previously created). Example without encryption:

   exec msdb.dbo.rds_restore_database 
           @restore_db_name=TARGET_DB_NAME, 
           
           @s3_arn_to_restore_from='arn:aws:s3:::BUCKET_NAME/FILENAME.bak';
   

4. Periodically check the status of the import job by running this query in a separate window:

   exec msdb.dbo.rds_task_status;

   If the status changes to Failed, look for the failure details in the message.