Changing the collation of the SQL Server 2005
After an installation of SQL Server 2005 a Software-Setup didn’t run because it demanded a case-insensitive collation. We had Latin1_General_CS_AI and wanted to change to Latin1_General_CI_AI.
This is not a trivial task and can make you a lot of pain, so maybe this helps. Many thanks to Tom Wisnowski.
This is his blog entry from http://geekswithblogs.net/mskoolaid/archive/2005/12/17/63413.aspx :
Step 1. Put SQL Server into Single User Mode
The first thing you will want to do is stop the SQL Sever Sevicer (sqlservr.exe) and the associated services (Agent, Full Text, Etc). There are a few ways to do this, but the easiest way would be to use the SQL Configuration Manager (Start->All Programs->Microsoft Sql Server 2005->Configuration Tools->Sql Server Configuration Manager). From this console you can manage the various SQL server services running on the machine. Right Click on each service listed and stop the service. The services are stopped, you can proceed to Step 2.
Step 2. Start the SQL server in Single User Mode
Open a command window and navigate to the folder where Sqlservr.exe resides (generally
Step 3. Rebuild the system databases
In SQL 2005, the rebuildm.exe program is nto supported. To rebuild the master database you need to use the setup.exe found on the SQL 2005 installation media. To rebuild, use the following command “start /wait setup.exe /qn INSTANCENAME=
Step 4. Restart the SQL Server Services in regular mode
End the command shell you started earlier. Ctrl-C to stop SQL server in single user mode, then close the command window. Go back to the Sql Server Configuration Manager and restart the SQL services.
Setup /QUIET /ACTION=REBUILDDATABASE /INSTANCENAME=InstanceName
/SQLSYSADMINACCOUNTS=accounts /[ SAPWD= StrongPassword ]
/SQLCOLLATION=CollationName
Use /SQLCOLLATION= with the name you need.
For a List of collations use: SELECT * FROM fn_helpcollations()
Latin1_General_
CI = Case Insenstive
CS = Case Senstive
AI = accent-senstive
AS = accent-insensitive and so forth.

