Clustering!

m4cc45 · 15 Jan 2008 at 19:22

Hi,

I just have a few questions with regards to clustering.

I know you need Windows 2003 Enterprise Edition - that's no problem.

I know that creating a cluster brings online a quorum drive which handles the replication.

What I wondered is how the date is replicated. I want to cluster SQL but wondered if I needed a SAN to store the databases or whether they can be stored locally?

Thanks,

M.

oddjob62 · 15 Jan 2008 at 19:29

m4cc45 said:
wondered if I needed a SAN to store the databases

Yes to nead a central storage that all nodes in the cluster can access, usually a DAS, Fibre Channel SAN or iSCSI.

m4cc45 · 15 Jan 2008 at 19:36

OK.

But I can use any kind of storage I like I guess? Such as a file share or SNAP drive?

Thanks,

M.

oddjob62 · 15 Jan 2008 at 19:39

m4cc45 said:
OK.

But I can use any kind of storage I like I guess? Such as a file share or SNAP drive?

AFAIK it can only be done with the ones i listed above.

m4cc45 · 15 Jan 2008 at 19:42

Thanks I'll have a look into it!

mandelbug · 16 Jan 2008 at 06:28

The drive has to be local to the server(s) so a DAS/SAN solution is required for clustering. SQL 7 was an absolute nightmare to cluster but 2k is cluster aware so just installs on the relevant cluster nodes. Not sure on 2k5 though.

It can be done with the Virtual PC stuff although its been a while since I did it so you can at least play around before running the live stuff

growse · 16 Jan 2008 at 08:08

Yup, both your quorum and your data partitions need to be on local devices but accessible to both, so you're looking at a SAN - I've done it with iSCSI both with 2k and 2k5, and once you get past the weird things to loook out for, it becomes quite easy