Hi,

About 2 weeks ago I was sent a full database backup from our client to restore at my work site (We are basically trying to maintain a copy of the client production databse on our site for data analysis and reporting).

I eventually restored the database .bak file (140 GB's) with default settings which means it was restored with the "Recovery" option which puts the DB back online as soon as the database restore is done.

Fast forward 4 weeks later.........I have been sent 62 transaction log files to restore (tack on) to the above referenced database, to bring our data uptodate. Now my problem is that I am trying to figure out how to convert or switch my database back to "NORECOVERY" mode so that my transaction log backups can be restored with a command such as the one below:

RESTORE LOG Database_name
FROM DISK = 'F:\filepath\Database_name.trn'
WITH NORECOVERY

Currently when I run this commend I get this error:

"Msg 3117, Level 16, State 4, Line 1
The log or differential backup cannot be restored because no files are ready to rollforward.
Msg 3013, Level 16, State 1, Line 1
RESTORE LOG is terminating abnormally."

Which means that my database is in the wrong state. Can someone please tell me how to switch my DB to "NORECOVERY" mode, because I do not want to have to redo a full database restoration - this time leaving the database in NORECOVERY mode so that I can restore the additional 62 transactional log files.

I would also like to mention that I'm going to keep receiving transactional log files for the next 10 months or so, so what is the best way to approach restortion without having to do a full database back-up everytime and then having to apply a ton of transactionals just to keep my data uptodate? I just want to be able to apply the latest transactional logs (4 log files per day) and be able to have multiple user have read access to the database...


Thanks for all your help

Wale.