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Before you install Windows 2003 clustering, we need to perform a series of important
preparation steps. This is especially important if you didn't build the cluster nodes, as you
want to ensure everything is working correctly before you begin the actual cluster installation.
Once they are complete, then you can install Windows 2003 clustering. Here are the steps you
must take:
• Double check to ensure that all the nodes are working properly and are configured
• Check to see that each node can see the data and Quorum drives on the shared array
or SAN. Remember, only one node can be on at a time until Windows 2003 clustering
is installed.
• Verify that none of the nodes has been configured as a Domain Controller.
• Check to verify that all drives are NTFS and are not compressed.
• Ensure that the public and private networks are properly installed and configured.
• Ping each node in the public and private networks to ensure that you have good
network connections. Also ping the Domain Controller and DNS server to verify that
• Verify that you have disabled NetBIOS for all private network cards.
• Verify that there are no network shares on any of the shared drives.
• If you intend to use SQL Server encryption, install the server certificate with the fully
qualified DNS name of the virtual server on all nodes in the cluster.
• Check all of the error logs to ensure there are no nasty surprises. If there are, resolve
• Add the SQL Server and Clustering service accounts to the Local Administrators group
software can reduce the availability of clusters and must not be installed on them. If
you want to check for possible viruses on a cluster, you can always install the software
• Check to verify that the Windows Cryptographic Service Provider is enabled on each of
the nodes.
• Check to verify that the Windows Task Scheduler service is running on each of the
nodes.
• If you intend to run SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services, you must then install IIS 6.0
These are a lot of things you must check, but each of these is important. If skipped, any one
of these steps could prevent your cluster from installing or working properly.
Now that all of your physical nodes and shared array or SAN is ready, you are now ready to
install Windows 2003 clustering. In this section, we take a look at the process, from beginning
to end.
To begin, you must start the Microsoft Windows 2003 Clustering Wizard from one of the
nodes. While it doesn't make any difference to the software which physical node is used to
begin the installation, I generally select one of the physical nodes to be my primary (active)
node, and start working there. This way, I won't potentially get confused when installing the
software.
If you are using a SCSI shared array, and for many SAN shared arrays, you will want to make
sure that the second physical node of your cluster is turned off when you install cluster
services on the first physical node. This is because Windows 2003 doesn't know how to deal
with a shared disk until cluster services is installed. Once you have installed cluster services
on the first physical node, you can turn on the second physical node, boot it, and then proceed
To begin your installation of SQL Server 2003 Clustering, open Cluster Administrator. If this is
the first cluster, then you will be presented with the following window.
From the Action drop-down box, select Create New Cluster and click OK. This brings up the
options, they can have negative consequences down the line. Because of this, it is important
that you carefully think through each of your responses. Ideally, you will already have made
The first choice you must make is the domain the cluster will be in. If you have a single
domain, this is an easy choice. If you have more than one domain, select the domain that all
The second choice is the name you will assign the virtual cluster. This is the name of the
virtual cluster, not the name of the virtual SQL Server. About the only time you will use this
name is when you connect to the cluster with Cluster Administrator. SQL Server 2005 clients
Assuming that you are running the Cluster Wizard on the primary node of your cluster, then
the computer name you see in the above screen will be the name of the physical node you are
installing on. If you are installing from one node, but want to install clustering on a different
node, you can, but it just gets confusing if you do. It is much easier to install on the same
node.
Notice the Advanced button in the screen shot above. If you click on it, you will see the
following.
Advanced Configuration Options allow you to choose from between a Typical and an Advanced
configuration. In almost all cases, the Typical configuration will work fine, and that is the
option we use during this example. The Advanced configuration option is only needed for
So click Cancel to return to the wizard, enter the correct physical node, if need be, and click
Next.
This next step is very important. What the Cluster Wizard does is to verify that everything is in
place before it begins the actual installation of the cluster service on the node. As you can see
above, the wizard goes through many steps, and if you did all of your preparation correctly,
when the testing is done, you will see a green bar under Tasks completed, and you will be
ready to proceed. But if you have not done all the preliminary steps properly, you may see
yellow or red icons next to one or more of the many tested steps, and a green or red bar
Ideally, you will want to see results similar to the figure above, with a green bar and no yellow
icons next to the test steps. In some cases, you may see yellow warning icons next to one or
more of the test steps, but still see a green bar at the bottom. While the green bar does
indicate that you can proceed, it does not mean the cluster will be completed successfully or
will be configured like you want it to be completed. If you see any yellow warning icons, you
can drill down into them and see exactly what the warning is. Read each warning very
carefully. If the warning is something unimportant to you, it can be ignored. But in most
cases, the yellow warnings need to be addressed. This may mean you will have to abort the
cluster service installation at this time to fix the problem. Then you can try to install it again.
If you get any red warning icons next to any of the test steps, then you will also get a red bar
at the bottom, which means that you have a major problem that needs to be corrected before
you can proceed. Drill down to see the message and act accordingly. Most likely, you will have
to abort the installation, fix the issue, and then try installation again.
Assuming that the installation is green and you are ready to proceed, click Next.
The next step is to enter the IP address of our virtual cluster. This is the IP address for the
cluster, not the virtual SQL Server. The IP address must be on the same subnet as all of the
account. You will also enter the account's password and the name of the domain where the
account was created. This account should have already been created in your domain and
added to all of the cluster nodes in the Local Administrators Group. Click Next.
The next Cluster Wizard step is the Proposed Cluster Configuration. But before you click Next,
be sure to click on the Quorum button and check which drive the Cluster Wizard has selected
for the Quorum. In this case Drive Q has been chosen, which is correct. Most of the time, the
Cluster Wizard will select the correct drive for the Quorum, but not always. This is why it is
important to check to see if the correct drive was chosen. Because I named my Quorum drive
"Q," it is very easy for me to determine that the correct drive was chosen by the Cluster
Administrator. That is why I earlier suggested that you name the Quorum drive "Q."
Assuming everything is OK, click OK to accept the Quorum drive, and then click Next. At this
time, the Cluster Wizard will reanalyze the cluster, again looking for any potential problems. If
none is found, click Next, and then click Finish to complete the installation of SQL Server 2003
the first node, the second node is installed from Cluster Administrator. Because the cluster
already exists, we are just adding the second node to the currently existing cluster. You can
install the second node from either the first node or the second node. Personally, I do it from
To install the second node, turn it on (it should have been off while you installed the first
node) and bring up Cluster Administrator. You will get the same window as you saw when you
installed the first node. From here, select Add Nodes to Cluster. This brings up the Add Nodes
Wizard, which is very similar to the previous New Server Cluster Wizard we just ran, except it
As the wizard proceeds, you will enter the name of the physical node to add to the current
cluster, after which a series of tests will be automatically run to verify that the node is ready
to be clustered. As before, if you run into any problems—yellow or red warnings—you should
correct them first before continuing. Once all problems have been corrected, you are then
asked to enter the password for the cluster service account (to prove that you have
permission to add a node to the cluster) and the node is added to the cluster.
Once you have successfully installed the two nodes of your cluster, it is a good idea to view
the nodes from Cluster Administrator. When you bring up Cluster Administrator for the first
time after creating a cluster, you may have to tell it to Open a Connection to Cluster, and type
in the name of the virtual cluster you just created. Once you have done this, the next time you
open Cluster Administrator it will automatically open this cluster for you by default.
After opening up Cluster Administrator, what you see will be very similar to the figure below.
Notice that two resource groups have been created for you: Cluster Group and Group 0. The
Cluster Group includes three cluster resources: the Cluster IP Address, the Cluster Name, and
the Quorum drive. These were all automatically created for you by the Cluster Wizard. We will
When you look next to each cluster resource, the State for each resource should be Online. If
not, then your cluster may have a problem that needs to be fixed. As a quick troubleshooting
technique, if any of the resources are not Online, right-click on the resource and choose Bring
Online. In some cases, this will bring the resource online and you will not experience any more
problems. But if this does not work, then you need to begin troubleshooting your cluster.
Also, next to each resource is listed the Owner of the resource. All the resources in a resource
group will always have the same owner. Essentially, the owner is the physical node where the
cluster resources are currently running. In the example above, the physical node they are
running on is SQL2005A, which is the first node in my two-node cluster. If a failover occurs,
then all of the resources in the resource group will change to the other node in your cluster.
Before you install SQL Server clustering, there is one small step you need to perform, and that
is to prepare a resource group for the SQL Server resources that will be created when SQL
Server is installed.
Most likely, when you created the cluster, as above, you will see a resource group named
Group 0. This resource group was created when the cluster was created, and it most likely
includes the shared resource for your SQL Server databases to use. See below.
In my example, Disk F, the shared array for SQL Server, is in Group 0. If you like, you can
leave the resource group with this name, but it is not very informative. I suggest that you
rename Group 0 to SQL Server Group. You can do this by right-clicking on Group 0 and
selecting Rename.
In some cases, the Cluster Wizard may put the SQL Server shared disk array in the Cluster
Group resource group and not create a Group 0. If this is the case, then you will need to
create a new resource group and then move the SQL Server shared disk array from the
Here's how you create a new resource group using Cluster Administrator:
• From the File menu, select New, then select Group. This starts the New Group Wizard.
• For the Name of the group, enter "SQL Server Group." Optionally, you can also enter a
• Now, you must select which nodes of your cluster will be running SQL Server. This of
course will be all of your nodes. The nodes are listed on the left side of the wizard.
CTRL-click each of the nodes on the left and then select Add. This will move the
selected nodes from the left side of the wizard to the right side. Click Finish.
The new SQL Server Group resource group has now been created.
Now that the group has been created, it must be brought online. Here's how.
• From Cluster Administrator, right-click on the SQL Server resource group (it will have
• The red dot next to the resource group name goes away, and the SQL Server Group
Now, your next step is to move any disk resources from the Cluster Group (except the
Quorum drive) to the SQL Server Group. This is a simple matter of dragging and dropping the
disk resources from the Cluster Group to the SQL Server Group. Once you have done this, you
Once you have installed Windows 2003 clustering on your nodes, you need to thoroughly test
the installation before beginning the SQL Server 2005 cluster install. If you don't, and
problems arise later with Windows 2003 clustering, you may have to remove SQL Server 2005
clustering to fix it, so you might as well identify any potential problems and resolve them now.
Below are a series of tests you can perform to verify that your Windows 2003 cluster is
working properly. After you perform each test, verify if you get the expected results (a
successful failover). Also be sure to check the Windows event log files for any possible
problems. If you find a problem during one test, resolve it before proceeding to the next test.
Once you have performed all of these tests successfully, then you are ready to continue with
Before you begin testing, identify a workstation that has Cluster Administrator on it, and use
this copy of Cluster Administrator for interacting with your cluster during testing. You will get a
better test using a remote copy of Cluster Administrator than trying to use a copy running on
The easiest test to perform is to use Cluster Administrator to manually move the Cluster
Group and SQL Server resource groups from the active node to a passive node, and then back
again. To do this, right-click on the Cluster Group and then select Move Group.
Once the group has been successfully moved from the active node to a passive node, then use
the same procedure above to move the group back to the original node. The moves should be
fairly quick and uneventful. Use Cluster Administrator to watch the failover and failback, and
check the Event Logs for possible problems. After moving the groups, all of the resources in
each group should be in the online state. If not, you have a problem that needs to be
This test is also performed from Cluster Administrator. Select any of the resources found in
the Cluster Group resource group (not the cluster group itself), right-click on it, and select
Initiate Failure. Because the cluster service always tries to recover up to three times from a
failure, if it can, you will have to select this option four times before a test failover is initiated.
Watch the failover from Cluster Administrator. After the failover, then failback using the same
procedure as described above, again watching the activity from Cluster Administrator. Check
the Event Logs for possible problems. After this test, all of the resources in each group should
be in the online state. If not, you have a problem that needs to be identified and corrected.
This time, we will only use Cluster Administrator to watch the failover activity, not to initiate it.
First, turn off the active node by turning it off hard. Once this happens, watch the failover in
Cluster Administrator. Once the failover occurs, turn the former active node on and wait until
it fully boots. Then turn off the now current active node by turning it off hard. And again,
watch the failover in Cluster Administrator. After the failover occurs, bring the off node back
on. Check the Event Logs for possible problems. After this test, all of the resources in each
group should be in the online state. If not, you have a problem that needs to be identified and
corrected.
In this test, we will see what happens if network connectivity fails. First, both nodes being
tested should be on. Second, unplug the public network connection from the active node. This
will cause a failover to a passive node, which you can watch in Cluster Administrator. Third,
plug the public network connection back into the server. Fourth, unplug the public network
connection from the now active node. This will cause a failover to the current passive node,
which you can watch in Cluster Administrator. Once the testing is complete, plug the network
connection back into the server. Check the Event Logs for possible problems. After this test,
all of the resources in each group should be in the online state. If not, you have a problem
This test is always exciting as it is the test that is most apt to identify potential problems.
First, from the active node, remove the shared array connection. This will cause a failover that
you can watch in Cluster Administrator. Now reconnect the broken connection. Second, from
the now active node, remove the shared array connection. Watch the failover in Cluster
Administrator. When done, reconnect the broken connection. Check the Event Logs for
possible problems. After this test, all of the resources in each group should be in the online
state. If not, you have a problem that needs to be identified and corrected.
As I mentioned before, if any particular test produces unexpected problems, such as failover
not working or errors are found in the Event Logs, identify and resolve them now before
proceeding with the next test. Once you have resolved any problems, be sure to repeat the
test that originally indicated the problem in order to verify that it has been fixed.
Now that you have completed the Windows 2003 cluster installation and have tested it, you
are ready to install and configure the Microsoft Distributed Transaction Coordinator.
While not required, it is recommended that you install the Microsoft Distributed Transaction
Coordinator (MS DTC) on each of the cluster nodes before installing SQL Server 2005
clustering. This is because SQL Server 2005 requires this service in order to perform some
functions, including running distributed queries, two-phase commit transactions, and some
aspects of replication. MS DTC must be installed after installing Windows 2003 clustering, but
configures MS DTC on all of the cluster nodes at the same time. Take your time to ensure that
• Right-click on the Cluster Group resource group, select New, then Resource. This
• In the first screen of the Resource Wizard, enter the name of the resource you are
creating, which would be "MSDTC Resource." If you like, you can also enter an
Click Next.
• In the Possible Owners dialog box, you will see that all of the nodes of the cluster are
listed under Possible Owners. This is correct and should not be changed. Click Next.
• In the Dependencies dialog box, press and hold the CTRL key on the Quorum disk
resource and the Cluster Name, then click Add. Then click finish.
Now that the resource has been created, it must be brought online. Here's how.
• From Cluster Administrator, right-click on the MSDTC Resource (it will have a red dot
The red dot next to the resource name goes away, and the MSDTC Resource is now online and
ready for use. If the new resource won't come online, delete it and try again.
Finally, you are ready to install SQL Server 2005 clustering. This topic will be covered in my
next article.