Installing RedBeam on Windows 8

Application: General
Area: Windows 8
Issue: Installing SQL Server on Windows 8.
Generally Caused By: Incompatibility
Level of Complexity: Medium

In some cases, we have seen where RedBeam does not properly install on computers with Windows 8. The reason for this is because the RedBeam installation comes pre-packaged with SQL Server 2005 Express, and this version of SQL is not compatible with Windows 8.

Once RedBeam is installed and you try opening the application, you may receive an error stating that Server (your server name)\RBAT, cannot be located or started. RBAT would be displayed as RIT or RCO depending on which application you have.

In this case you will need to manually install SQL Server 2008 Express. The download and steps for this installation can be found here.