• SharePoint Foundation 2013 SP1
• SQL Server 2014 Express CU2
• SQL 2014 Installation, Configuration
• Optimization for SharePoint 2013 (Server 2012 R2)

In this step-by-step screencast, we demonstrate how to install SharePoint 2013 Foundation on Server 2012 R2. In addition, we demonstrate the installation and configuration of SQL Server 2014 Express on a separate Windows 2012 R2 member server, which is the so called two-tier deployment.

While the actual SharePoint installation process is extremely simplified, and normally that’s what you will see in the click-next instructions on the Internet, implementing a SharePoint server in a production environment requires careful planning and preparation.
That includes:
– Creating the required SharePoint and SQL server install, service, and admin accounts and granting them the required permissions.
– Preparing a member server for the SQL server installation – dedicating separate disks for the DB and Logs, formatting them with 64KB allocation unit size, making sure that you are using fixed size virtual disks and that the underlying physical disks also are using 64KB units (in case SQL is running in a VM) etc.
– Slipstreaming and applying the latest SharePoint and SQL Server Cumulative Updates during installation.
– Optimizing SQL Server 2014 for SharePoint 2013 is crucial for the successful deployment, and step 3 covers thoroughly this topic.

SharePoint 2013 Foundation and SQL Server 2104 Express are both free editions and come with certain limitations. As you will see in our demo, the SQL Server 2014 Express memory limits are actually higher than the official 1GB buffer cache per instance. In addition, implementing Remote Blob Storage (using the FileStream provider) allows documents and files to be stored on the file system instead of inside the database itself. As a result, you get improved performance, and you get past the 10GB per database SQL express limit for your content databases.

To keep things simple, we demonstrate how to install and configure Remote Blob Storage in SharePoint 2013 and SQL Server 2014 in our next Screencast.

For your convenience, we provide the text file with our project plan and the commands that we are using in the screencast here .

Step 1 We start with creating the required SharePoint 2013 and SQL Server 2014 install, service, and admin accounts. Then, we grant permissions to the install accounts on the SharePoint and SQL member servers.

Step 2 Next, we demonstrate how to prepare the member server for the SQL server installation. In addition, you will see how to slipstream the latest SQL Server 2014 Cumulative Update (CU2) and apply it during the installation process.

Step 3 In this step, we configure protocols and firewall rules on the SQL server. Then, we optimize SQL Server 2014 for SharePoint 2013.

Step 4 Finally, we perform the SharePoint 2013 installation. In a similar way, we slipstream the latest Cumulative Update into the installation files. Then, we complete the installation and perform the initial configuration of our new SharePoint 2013 Farm.