Automatic failover with SQL Server Standard?

Hi,
We are trying to implement SQL server failover by using
Windows 2003 "Enterprise" clustering and SQL
Server "Standard" to try to save the cost of SQL Server
Etnerprise. From what I understand we cannot have
automatic failover of the SQL server service with this
configuration.
Could someone please explaing to me techinically why we
cannot do this:
- Implement W2003 Enterprise OS clustering.
- Install SQL server "standard" installed on both machines
in the OS cluster.
- Have the SQL server service start on the primary node in
the OS cluster and manage the database. Then ...
as part of the OS cluster confifuration, if the primary
node goes down, request that the SQL server service starts
up on the backup node as part of the OS failover.
Can't the clients continue to talk to the SQL server
database since it is not started up on the backup node and
has the same IP address?
Thanks!
As you rightly said, SQL Server 2000 Failover Clustering is NOT supported with SQL Server 2000 Standard Edition. It is fully supported on SQL Server 2000 Enterprise Edition.
You can install and configure any non-cluster aware application as a generic service on a cluster. You can even make notepad clustered as a generic service in a cluster if you like.
I have not seen anybody doing following this approach (using sql server 2000 std edition as a generic service). I wouldn't recommend it. This will be like a custom solution and if you have any issues with the failover
working properly, the support that you will get will be very limited. If you have to work with SQL Server 2000 Standard Edition then I would recommend exploring SQL Server Replication.
To get an idea of what SQL Server 2000 EE Failover Clustering does please refer to the following whitepaper.
Microsoft Whitepaper - SQL Server 2000 Failover Clustering
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/pro.../failclus.mspx
Cluster Support Policy
Microsoft's Cluster support policy is below
Cluster (General): http://support.microsoft.com/default...b;en-us;309395
Cluster (SQL): http://support.microsoft.com/default...b;en-us;327518
Best Regards,
Uttam Parui
Microsoft Corporation
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|||Note that Veritas support clustering SQL2000 Standard. When I've used it,
it's been just using VCS and not involving MCS at all but I believe it can
sit on top if it as well. I think they've rebranded recently so its called
Storage Foundation High Availability rather than Veritas Cluster Server to
reflect its reliance on Veritas Volume Manager (which is now called Storage
Foundation). I actually prefer the Veritas cluster management tools to the
MS tools and it's a lot cheaper than going to Enterprise Edition if the only
reason you need Enterprise is clustering (and not performance/large memory
support etc).
HTH
Jasper Smith (SQL Server MVP)
http://www.sqldbatips.com
I support PASS - the definitive, global
community for SQL Server professionals -
http://www.sqlpass.org
<anonymous@.discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:2ec3601c46d96$f335fc60$a601280a@.phx.gbl...
> Hi,
> We are trying to implement SQL server failover by using
> Windows 2003 "Enterprise" clustering and SQL
> Server "Standard" to try to save the cost of SQL Server
> Etnerprise. From what I understand we cannot have
> automatic failover of the SQL server service with this
> configuration.
> Could someone please explaing to me techinically why we
> cannot do this:
> - Implement W2003 Enterprise OS clustering.
> - Install SQL server "standard" installed on both machines
> in the OS cluster.
> - Have the SQL server service start on the primary node in
> the OS cluster and manage the database. Then ...
> as part of the OS cluster confifuration, if the primary
> node goes down, request that the SQL server service starts
> up on the backup node as part of the OS failover.
> Can't the clients continue to talk to the SQL server
> database since it is not started up on the backup node and
> has the same IP address?
> Thanks!
>

Auto Generating Phantom drives

I'm running SQL on a clustering configuration. I recently started noticing
these phantom drives appearing under my computer. They are all relatively
close in size and it appears to only create one phantom drive each Sunday. I
currently have the SQL Server backing up it's files to the real Local drive
and from there it goes to tape. I do not only back up on Sunday I backup the
same way each day. The phantom drives do not show up under Disk Manager only
under My Computer.
Anyone every experience these phantom drives appearing.
Peter
Disks or drives? They are different.
Disks could be from your SAN solution, managing snapshot copies and other
head-in components.
Drives are one of two possible scenarios:
Have you been presenting replacement LUNs to your cluster? If so, you could
be seeing remnants of the old definitions. You might want to rescan the
disks and then reboot the servers to remove the old ones.
The more likely scenario is the use of the OTM (Open Transaction Manager) in
conjunction with the Veritas NetBackup or BackupExec. OTM can create
temporary shares that look like drives that it uses for snapshot copies
while doing backup acceleration.
They go away once the tape archive has completed successfully. If they
remain, then you probably had a backup failure and Veritas failed to remove
the share.
Sincerely,
Anthony Thomas

"Peter" <peter@.discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:373FDF72-009C-44A6-AF0D-E09B4D0710BE@.microsoft.com...
> I'm running SQL on a clustering configuration. I recently started noticing
> these phantom drives appearing under my computer. They are all relatively
> close in size and it appears to only create one phantom drive each Sunday.
I
> currently have the SQL Server backing up it's files to the real Local
drive
> and from there it goes to tape. I do not only back up on Sunday I backup
the
> same way each day. The phantom drives do not show up under Disk Manager
only
> under My Computer.
> Anyone every experience these phantom drives appearing.
> --
> Peter