6.5.1
Table Of Contents
- Setup for Failover Clustering and Microsoft Cluster Service
- Contents
- About Setup for Failover Clustering and Microsoft Cluster Service
- Getting Started with MSCS
- Clustering Configuration Overview
- Hardware and Software Requirements for Clustering
- Supported Shared Storage Configurations
- PSP_RR Support for MSCS
- iSCSI Support for MSCS
- FCoE Support for MSCS
- vMotion support for MSCS
- vSphere MSCS Setup Limitations
- MSCS and Booting from a SAN
- Set up CCR and DAG Groups
- Setting up AlwaysOn Availability Groups with SQL Server 2012
- Cluster Virtual Machines on One Physical Host
- Cluster Virtual Machines Across Physical Hosts
- Cluster Physical and Virtual Machines
- Use MSCS in an vSphere HA and vSphere DRS Environment
- vSphere MSCS Setup Checklist
- Index
Clustering MSCS Virtual Machines on a Single Host
A cluster of MSCS virtual machines on a single host (also known as a cluster in a box) consists of clustered
virtual machines on the same ESXi host. The virtual machines are connected to the same storage, either local
or remote. This conguration protects against failures at the operating system and application level, but it
does not protect against hardware failures.
N Windows Server 2008 R2 and above releases support up to ve nodes (virtual machines). Windows
Server 2003 SP2 systems support two nodes.
The following gure shows a cluster in a box setup.
n
Two virtual machines on the same physical machine (ESXi host) run clustering software.
n
The virtual machines share a private network connection for the private heartbeat and a public network
connection.
n
Each virtual machine is connected to shared storage, which can be local or on a SAN.
Figure 1‑1. Virtual Machines Clustered on a Single Host
physical machine
virtual machine
Node1
cluster
software
virtual machine
Node2
cluster
software
storage (local or SAN)
private
network
public
network
Clustering Virtual Machines Across Physical Hosts
A cluster of virtual machines across physical hosts (also known as a cluster across boxes) protects against
software failures and hardware failures on the physical machine by placing the cluster nodes on separate
ESXi hosts. This conguration requires shared storage on an Fibre Channel SAN for the quorum disk.
The following gure shows a cluster-across-boxes setup.
n
Two virtual machines on two dierent physical machines (ESXi hosts) run clustering software.
n
The virtual machines share a private network connection for the private heartbeat and a public network
connection.
n
Each virtual machine is connected to shared storage, which must be on a SAN.
N A quorum disk can be congured with iSCSI, FC SAN or FCoE. A quorum disk must have a
homogenous set of disks. This means that if the conguration is done with FC SAN, then all of the cluster
disks should be FC SAN only. Mixed mode is not supported.
Setup for Failover Clustering and Microsoft Cluster Service
8 VMware, Inc.