Deployment Guide

Preparing Your Systems for Clustering 51
Configuring the RAID Level for the Shared Storage Subsystem
The virtual disks in your shared storage subsystem must be configured into
disk groups or virtual disks using the Dell PowerVault Modular Storage
Manager software. All virtual disks, especially if they are used for the quorum
resource, should be bound and should incorporate the appropriate RAID level
to ensure high availability.
NOTE: It is recommended that you use a RAID level other than RAID 0 (which is
commonly called striping). RAID 0 configurations provide very high performance,
but do not provide the level of availability required for the quorum resource. See the
documentation for your storage system for more information about setting up RAID
levels for your system.
Windows Operating System and Dynamic Volumes
The Windows operating system does not support dynamic disks (upgraded
disks) or volumes as shared cluster storage. If the shared cluster storage is
configured as a dynamic disk, the Cluster Configuration wizard is not able to
discover the disks, preventing the cluster and network clients from accessing
the disks.
Assigning Drive Letters and Mount Points
A mount point is a drive attached to an empty folder on an NTFS volume. A
mount point functions the same as a normal drive but is assigned a label or
name instead of a drive letter. Using mount points, a cluster can support more
shared disks than the number of available drive letters.
The cluster installation procedure does not automatically add the mount
point into the disks managed by the cluster. To add the mount point to the
cluster, create a physical disk resource in the cluster resource group for each
mount point. Ensure that the new physical disk resource is in the same cluster
resource group and is dependent on the root disk (i.e., the disk from which
the mount point is attached).
NOTE: Mount points are supported in Microsoft Cluster on the Windows Server
2003 operating systems only. When mounting a drive to an NTFS volume, do not
create mount points from the quorum resource or between the clustered disks and
the local disks. Mount points must be in the same cluster resource group and must
be dependent on the root disk.
book.book Page 51 Tuesday, April 15, 2008 12:30 PM