For troubleshooting purposes, I would like to be able to check if a client can connect to a SQL Server instance, independent of the application that possibly can't connect to the SQL Server.
Is there an easy way (that means, not having to install 3rd party software) to do this using the default Windows system tools? Perhaps using scripts or network applications?
Best Answer
If the server is using TCP/IP, then the simple way is to just telnet to the SQL Server port and see if it connects. By default, that's port 1433, so this should work:
That will probably be appropriate in most cases.
If it's using a different port, or dynamic ports (common with a named instance), then you'll need to determine which port it's currently listening on. Check SQL Server configuration manager to see if it's a specific port, or dynamic ports. If it's using dynamic ports, then as long as you don't have multiple instances on the server,
netstat -abnis probably the simplest way to find what it's using. Otherwise, dig through the Windows event log or the SQL Server error log for a message indicating which port is in use by the instance.If SQL Server is using Named Pipes, then I believe if you're able to access shares on the machine, you have adequate network connectivity. This article says you can go further and try connecting to the IPC$ share:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa275787%28v=sql.80%29.aspx
That's written for SQL Server 2000, but I don't imagine this aspect has changed much, if at all.