Gavin’s Technology Weblog

How to create a Windows Server 2008 Cluster within Hyper-V using simulated iSCSI storage

Windows Server 2008 failover clusters support Serial Attached SCSI (SAS), iSCSI and Fibre Channel disks as storage options.  So, how would you go about setting up a virtual Windows Server 2008 test cluster using the new Hyper-V virtualisation product?  The method I am about to outline is a little differnt to what you might be used to Virtual Server 2005.  The following steps detail how I managed to setup a test cluster using simulated iSCSI storage.  Before beginning it’s worth reviewing this article that outlines the storage options that are available to Hyper-V.  By the end of this post you should have a simple two node cluster up and running using simulated iSCSI storage.

 Tools for the job:

• A Windows Server 2008 server x64 server with the Hyper-V role enabled (I used a Dell Precision 390)
• One Windows Server 2008 VM to act as a Domain Controller (Clusters must be part of a domain) 
• Two Windows Server 2008 VMs to act as Cluster Nodes
• One Windows Server 2003 SP2 VM (or you could use Windows Server 2008 in a Core install to maximise VM performance)
• iSCSI Target Software: I used Rocket Divisions StarWind product that is available as a 30 day eval and is reasonably priced
• iSCSI Initiator software (built into Windows Server 2008)

I wont go into how to create a VM but you can find more info from Virtual Guys weblog.

Before I began looking into the iSCSI simulated storage option for my cluster nodes I tried to expose a single VHD to each of my cluster nodes in the hopes that they would share it.  I didnt get very far and was presented with the following error when powering on the VMs:

This error is by design (thanks Justin Zarb for point this out) as Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V does not support this sort of storage (see link above for Hyper-V storage options).  The above error is simply a file system error as the VHD “is being used by another process” … should have spotted that

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Posted in Clusters, Virtualisation, Windows Server 2008 | 1 Comment »

Hyper-V : Windows Server 2003 VM - Where is my network card?

There are plenty of articles out there explaining how to install the Hyper-V and get a Windows Server 2008 VM up and running.  One such article is Virtual PC Guy’s weblog (Here). 

What if you want to get a Windows Server 2003 VM up and running?  One thing to bear in mind is that a Windows Server 2003 VM will not have the drivers for the virtual NIC straight out of the bag.  To pick up the drivers you need to install the Hyper-V integration components.  If you have created your VM with an ISO or CD that is pre SP2 then you are going to run into issues.  You’ll have no NIC and you will not be able to install the integration components.  Why?  See the image below.

No network card without the Hyper-V integration components, no Hyper-V integration components without SP2, no network card to download or copy SP2. 

So how do you get around this issue?  Well, there are a few options but perhaps the easiet way is to create an ISO with SP2 on it.

 Tools for the job:

• Windows 2003 SP2 which can be found here
• Something to create the ISO with.  I used NBXSoft - Free Create-Burn ISO which worked nicely on the x64 Windows Server 2008 host. 

What next?

• Create your ISO and attach the VMs CD drive to it
• Install Windows 2003 SP2 and reboot
• Try and install the Integration Services again from the Action menu

If there are any problems detecting hardware try removing it from Device Manager and bouncing the VM.

Note: You wont run into this issue with a Windows Server 2008 VM as the integration components are built in.

Posted in Virtualisation, Windows Server 2008 | 4 Comments »

Here we go!

Ok, so this is the first post of what will hopefully be many.  Realistically thought, it’s more than likely the first of a few.  Time will tell.  I want my blog to include some of the bits I’ve picked up along the way … almost a brain dump.  I will hopefully post some stuff on the Windows operating systems as well as a few other technology areas.

Posted in General | No Comments »