In this post I’m planning to walkthrough the practice of changing the SharePoint 2010 Search Service Database names as you might need it in the following scenarios:

• Replacing the Search Service Application Databases Names that Includes GUID’s to a friendlier name.
• The Database Admin in the Organization is planning to change the naming convention of all the Databases names in the Data Center.
• If you are planning to move from one Farm to another that has a different Naming Convention.

You have many options to do this practice as shown in the below figure, but in this post I will walkthrough the preferred steps only to make it simple and clear:

Renaming Property & Crawl DBs using Central Administration:

Verify that the user account that is performing the procedure is a member of the Farm Administrators SharePoint group.

1. In Central Administration, click Application Management.
2. On the Application Management page, click Manage service applications.
3. Click the name of the Search Service Application.
4. On the Search Administration page, click Modify.
5. On the Manage Search Topology page, the following three databases are listed: Administration, Crawl, and Property. You can point to renamed or moved Crawl or Property databases by using this procedure.
6. Click the database that you want to change, and then click Edit Properties.
7. In the Database Server text box, type the new server location if there is one; in the Database Name text box, type the new name for the database; and then click OK.
8. On the Manage Search Topology page, click Apply Topology Changes.

Notes:

• You cannot point to a renamed or moved Search Administration database by using Central Administration.
• It might take several minutes for the changes to take effect.

Renaming Search Service Application Database using PowerShell:

Verify that you meet the following minimum requirements: See Add-SPShellAdmin.

1. On the Start menu, click All Programs.
2. Click Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Products.
3. Click SharePoint 2010 Management Shell.
4. At the Windows PowerShell command prompt, type the following commands:
• Point the Search Administration database to its new name or location.

$searchapp | Set-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplication -DatabaseName "<NewDbName>" -DatabaseServer "<NewServerName>" 

Where:

• <NewDbName> is the name of the renamed database
• <NewServerName> is the new database location
5. Monitor whether the search instances have finished re-provisioning.

Do {write-host -NoNewline .;Sleep 10; $searchInstance = Get-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceInstance -Local} while ($searchInstance.Status -ne "Online")

Additional References:

1. Rename FAST Search for SharePoint 2010 Databases
2. Rename or  Move Service Application
3. Change database (FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint)