Active/Active File server

[vkode78]

I have some questions on this setup and hope to get some suggestions before I implement this:

Here is our proposed setup

2 IBM x346 nodes, DS400 SAN for shared storage, MS 2003 enterprise server

1) I decided Active/Active as opposed to active/passive because I feel that each IBM x346 should independently handle all the file sharing load.

Any problems you notice in this thinking other than the fact that as the file shares grow, we have to be aware that one server should handle all the load in the event of a failure on one node.

2) I want to have multiple DFS roots spread over on the two nodes. Is this the way to go?

3) In the network setup, does active/active cluster setup support each each node on different network segments.
For example, we want node A to be on 10.10.2.x and connect to switch A, and node B to be on 10.10.3.x and connect to switch B. This way we dont have a "switch" being the single point of failure.

4) Any suggestions for File share clusters will be very appreciated.

Thank You for all your help
Kode

 

[deeno]

I'm not sure about your part with having each node on a separate network segment... I know for sure it is possible to plug them into 2 switches as long as they are in the same subnet, though.

More interresting is the requirement to have 2 nodes accessing a single LUN at the same time. Is this what you intend, or do you plan to have a multiple LUNs, where no two nodes would access them at the same time? The reason I ask is because I don't think that Microsoft can support multiple nodes accessing the same LUN at the same time.

We run an active/active clustered file system, but the cluster portion runs on something called HP StorageWorks Enterprise File Services Clustered Gateway. It includes something called the HP CFS Management Console to manage the cluster. It is not a MSCS cluster. The shares presented are CIFS shares, and I believe it can scale to up to 16 nodes. I believe the HP side of this is built on a product offered by PolyServe.

I'll add that with our solution, the file system on which the files sit for the shares is PSFS. PloyServe File System. It's almost identical to NTFS but with some minor differences. If you are running something that requires NTFS make sure that it will run with PSFS. We had an issue since the HP File Migration Agent can't run on a PSFS File System.

Anyway, if you have any questions feel free to post back...