2-Node Setup with NLB

[spacenoxx]

We are proposing a Sharepoint setup to senior management and in this regard would like to highlight load balancing if possible

In a 2 Node Starwind Hyper-V Cluster in this case as per your diagram (http://hyperv.starwindsoftware.com/two- ... -iscsi-san) will there be only one active instance of a VM (which gets migrated between the hyperv nodes) or 2?

The reason being if only 1 instance of VM is active then, it might make more sense not to use Starwind and instead go for SQL Server replication for Database and Multiple SharePoint VMs behind a couple of HA Proxy Servers.

Or may be only use Stardwind HA Device for SQL and run the rest of the VMs as SP-1, SP-2, SP3, SP4 behind a HA Proxy

[anton (staff)]

1) We deal with storage we're not anyhow related to actual hypervisor. So we can provide mechanism for VMs to be HA and clustered but we don't do VM Fault Tolerance (see ESXi features) and that's what you need (2 running VMs). Re-think what you do as FT is PITA making long story short.

2) If possible yes use SQL Server built-in clustering features (AlwaysOn). But that requires Failover Cluster and some witness (folder or disk). And you'll need some back end for that (StarWind as we have minimal footprint, just two physical nodes).

3) HA proxy is never a good idea as it injects complexity, latency and is hell to manage. Good reading why HA front end if front of a legacy storage is a bad idea:

http://chucksblog.emc.com/chucks_blog/2 ... orage.html

[spacenoxx]

Thanks for the reply.

I am thinking, the WFE (Web Front End) servers will use built-in WIndows NLB so that they can act as a Web cluster which does HA as well as fail-over. This wont be part of Starwind HA-Device.


On the other hand Starwind-HA for SQL on the same hypervisor is possible? If so the only concern could be the IOPS with local storage but I think it should be reasonable for about 1200-1500 users if you consider 8x 300GB 15K RPM drives in a RAID-10

To put it simply. Can Starwind be used for only 1 of the 3 VMs on the Hyper-V and mirror the setup on the second Hyper-V node as well where the VM on the Starwind HA-Device can fail over to the second Hyper-V node in case the first goes down?

Which Starwind license would be appropriate for this ? SQL size is expected to be under 500GB and 2 Hyper-V servers are involved.

[anton (staff)]

1) I'm not a scpecialist with the scenario you list so really cannot comment

2) DAS performance is always higher compared to the same DAS but with a SAN or NAS re-route: latency is lower with DAS only and Virtual SAN uses Ethernet for write confirmation only and SAN / NAS use Ethernet (or other fibre) for all traffic. Making long story short: you should have no issues with performance as long as you've calculated your IOPS properly and picked up right number of spindles and proper RAID layout.

3) Yes, StarWind can be used @ VM level. Have customers doing this. No probs. You need Native SAN (Virtual SAN soon) with a smallest 1TB of licensed capacity.

Thanks for the reply.

I am thinking, the WFE (Web Front End) servers will use built-in WIndows NLB so that they can act as a Web cluster which does HA as well as fail-over. This wont be part of Starwind HA-Device.


On the other hand Starwind-HA for SQL on the same hypervisor is possible? If so the only concern could be the IOPS with local storage but I think it should be reasonable for about 1200-1500 users if you consider 8x 300GB 15K RPM drives in a RAID-10

To put it simply. Can Starwind be used for only 1 of the 3 VMs on the Hyper-V and mirror the setup on the second Hyper-V node as well where the VM on the Starwind HA-Device can fail over to the second Hyper-V node in case the first goes down?

Which Starwind license would be appropriate for this ? SQL size is expected to be under 500GB and 2 Hyper-V servers are involved.