How to turn IDENTITY_INSERT on and off using SQL Server 2008?

Import: You must write columns in INSERT statement

INSERT INTO TABLE
SELECT * FROM    

Is not correct.

Insert into Table(Field1,...)
Select (Field1,...) from TABLE

Is correct

Via SQL as per MSDN

SET IDENTITY_INSERT sometableWithIdentity ON

INSERT INTO sometableWithIdentity 
    (IdentityColumn, col2, col3, ...)
VALUES 
    (AnIdentityValue, col2value, col3value, ...)

SET IDENTITY_INSERT sometableWithIdentity OFF

The complete error message tells you exactly what is wrong...

Cannot insert explicit value for identity column in table 'sometableWithIdentity' when IDENTITY_INSERT is set to OFF.

I had a problem where it did not allow me to insert it even after setting the IDENTITY_INSERT ON.

The problem was that i did not specify the column names and for some reason it did not like it.

INSERT INTO tbl Values(vals)

So basically do the full INSERT INTO tbl(cols) Values(vals)