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K-soft
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Microsoft Clustering RDM sharing between two VMs in spererate hosts (ESX 3.5)

I'm trying to setup Microsoft Custer between VM's running on two ESX 3.5 Hosts.

and trying to add disk on node 1 and node 2 as per "http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi3_vm_and_mscs.pdf"

However on the second node I'm not able to select RDM option when adding disk.

Am i missing something here ?

Thanks,

Anil

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SimonLong
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Hi Anil, on the second node instead of adding RDM's you need to add normal Hard Disk but when creating it select "Use an existing virtual disk". You'll then need to point them to where they are added on the first node, so find the datastore that the first node resides on and in there you will see the RDM drives you create.

I'd reccomend shutting down both nodes before doing this as sometimes you get browse issues and VI Client locks up.

If you haven't already i'd reccomend using egarzeroedthick, although this may take a little longer to start with performance will be better then using zeroedthick.

Simon

Visit My Blog, The SLOG at: http://www.simonlong.co.uk

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Yattong
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Hey,

Did you eager zero out the disk?

Have you changed the SCSI Controller to be shared?

Have you placed the shared disk / RDM on SCSI node 1:0?

Try adding the RDM whilst the 2nd Node is powered off...



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K-soft
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i did not zero out the disk. Is it necessary ?. if yes how to do it.

SCSI BUS sharing is set to physical

and RDM mapped to SCSI 1:0 node

Node 2 was powered of while adding RDM to node 1.

I have done following steps.

1 Select the virtual machine just created and choose Edit Settings.

2 Click Add, select Hard Disk, and click Next.

3 In the Select a Disk page, choose Mapped SAN LUN and click Next

Your hard disk points to a LUN that uses RDM.

4 In the LUN selection page, choose an unformatted LUN and click Next.

Ask your SAN administrator which of the LUNs are unformatted. You can also see

all formatted LUNs in the host’s Configuration tab and deduce which LUNs are

unformatted by comparing the list of formatted LUNs with the list in the LUN

selection page.

5 In the Select Datastore page, select the local datastore, which is also the location of

the boot disk, then click Next.

This is the location where the RDM (mapping) is stored.

6 Select Physical compatibility mode, then click Next.

A SCSI Controller that uses physical compatibility mode is created when the

virtual hard disk is created.

7 Choose a new virtual device node, for example choose SCSI(1:0) and use the

default mode.

8 Click Finish to complete creating the disk.

9 Select the new SCSI controller and click Change Controller Type. Select LsiLogic

in the dialog box that appears.

10 In the same panel, set SCSI Bus Sharing to Physical, then click OK.

Still RDM selection is disabled on second node.

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Yattong
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ahh no, you only need to zero-out a vmdk.

Make sure that the LUN has been correctly zoned in for the 2nd ESX host.

Has the 2nd ESX host been rescanned to see this particular LUN?



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SimonLong
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Hi Anil, on the second node instead of adding RDM's you need to add normal Hard Disk but when creating it select "Use an existing virtual disk". You'll then need to point them to where they are added on the first node, so find the datastore that the first node resides on and in there you will see the RDM drives you create.

I'd reccomend shutting down both nodes before doing this as sometimes you get browse issues and VI Client locks up.

If you haven't already i'd reccomend using egarzeroedthick, although this may take a little longer to start with performance will be better then using zeroedthick.

Simon

Visit My Blog, The SLOG at: http://www.simonlong.co.uk
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K-soft
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I thought pointing to same RDM disk pointer for node 1 is for clustering VM's within same Host.

Is it the same procedure for clustering between VM's in two separate hosts. In that case i have keep the RDM disk pointer on SAN.

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Yattong
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Yep,

Its all there on Task 4, adding the disk to 2nd Node

Task 4: Adding Hard Disks to Node2

After you have set up Node1, set up Node2 so the private and public networks match.

 

Then share the quorum and any shared data disks for Node1 with Node2. You have the 

option of reusing the existing RDM that you created when setting up the first cluster 

node.(SEE UPDATE)

To reuse a SAN-based RDM

1 On Node2, click Add, select Hard Disk, and click Next.

2 In the Select a Disk page, choose Use Existing Disk, and click Next.

3 Select the RDM created on the shared datastore in Step 5 for Node1.

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SimonLong
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Another little tip... Add your extra SCSI adapter before you add your extra NICS, if you dont you can loose NIC1 and all the settings assigned to it.

Simon

Visit My Blog, The SLOG at: http://www.simonlong.co.uk
Texiwill
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Hello,

Moved to VI: Virtual Machine and GUest OS forum.


Best regards,

Edward L. Haletky

VMware Communities User Moderator

====

Author of the book 'VMWare ESX Server in the Enterprise: Planning and Securing Virtualization Servers', Copyright 2008 Pearson Education.

SearchVMware Blog: http://itknowledgeexchange.techtarget.com/virtualization-pro/

Blue Gears Blogs - http://www.itworld.com/ and http://www.networkworld.com/community/haletky

As well as the Virtualization Wiki at http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Virtualization

--
Edward L. Haletky
vExpert XIV: 2009-2023,
VMTN Community Moderator
vSphere Upgrade Saga: https://www.astroarch.com/blogs
GitHub Repo: https://github.com/Texiwill
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