Configure SQL server fail-over cluster and Always On in multi-subnet environment-Part 2

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Lets Begin: We are going to start a series of blogs on configuring SQL server fail-over cluster and AG in multi-subnet environment.

This is the 2nd part of the series where we will take you through setting up Windows cluster first on Multi-subnet followed by SQL cluster and AG on top.

Click Here to get part-1 of this series.

Windows server 2012 R2 and SQL sever 2014 are taken as an example in this series.

  • IMP Note:- Multi-subnet windows cluster has been supported from Windows server 2008 Onward but for SQL, multi-subnet fail-over cluster started from version:- SQL server 2012 onward.
  • We have considered the setup for multi-subnet as per below example.
  • California–> In same subnet–>Same(1st) Datacenter–>SQL fail-over cluster will be setup between them in same subnet.
  • New York–> In Different subnet–>Different DC(2nd)–> AG will be setup between 1st and 2nd DC i.e. multi-subnet network.
Windows Cluster Installation Step
Features Installation for Windows Cluster

Pre-Installation Configuration for Windows Cluster

  1. Add Servers to Domain
  2. Create a Domain User for Installation of Windows Cluster
  3. Add Domain User to Local Administrator Group on both the Servers to be added  to Windows Cluster
  4. Ensure LUN are attached for Quorum Configuration
  5. Server Manager –> Add Features –> Failover Cluster Manager
  6. Ensure while selecting Add Features all the Components for Failover Cluster Manager are selected and installed

Note: Repeat the same steps and restart the servers after Features & Roles Installation in all participating nodes

Fail-over cluster Setup

Start the Failover Cluster Manager on NODE1 (California Primary DC) and do a validations Test for Cluster Installation from the location as shown in the figure below.

Now go to Cluster Failover manager and click on Validate Configuration from the action menu in Failover Cluster Manager MMC.

Once we click on Validate Configuration for creation of Cluster, we need to add nodes to be included in cluster i.e. 2 Nodes from California Primary DC and 1 from NewYork DC for AG-DR

Refer the below screenshot for the same.

Click next once you select the server names and choose runs all tests as shown in figure below.

After the cluster’s hardware configuration validated, it is now time to create a new Windows Failover cluster.

Note:  Before we start to create a new windows Cluster we need to check validation report and rectify errors specified in Validation Report.

Create Windows Cluster

The following steps describe how to create a Windows Failover Cluster.

As shown below in figure choose Create a Cluster in Actions Menu in Failover Cluster Manager MMC.

Once we click on create cluster the below screen will pop-up, click next to start installation for windows cluster.

Node Selection in Create Cluster
  • Enter the fully qualified Nodes name, all participating nodes in windows cluster i.e. 2 nodes from California DC and 1 from NewYork DC
  • Enter windows cluster name and IP address,please refer Part-1 for IP details i.e. Virtual IP for California DC network and Virtual IP from different subnet i.e. NewYork netwrok thus total 2 IP from different subnet.
  • Verify all the details and create the cluster.

Click here to get its Part-1

Part-3 coming soon…

Hope this helps!

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