NIC Binding Order On Server Core – Error 0x000013AB – A cluster network is not available for this operation

The initial NIC binding post had what we thought was the correct binding order for the NICs.

Now we have discovered that the order we had was not correct.

Note the following error when we tried to Live Migrate a Windows 7 VM that was stood up on the cluster late this afternoon:

'Virtual Machine TD-Win7Mgmt-01' live migration did not succeed at the source.

Failed to get the network address for the destination node 'TD-HV_NODE-01': A cluster network is not available for this operation. (0x000013AB)

The problem was the order we had the bindings in according to Chris Adams:

• Chris’s Blog: Real World Example of Troubleshooting R2 Live Migration using CSV’s

Note that the correct binding order as of this writing is:

1. Microsoft Failover Cluster Virtual Adapter
2. NIC 0: Management
3. NIC 1: Cluster Heartbeat
4. NIC x: iSCSI (if needed)
5. Microsoft Virtual Network Switch Adapter
6. NIC 2+: Bind the MS Virtual Switch.
   1. NICs disappear from the binding keys after the Virtual Switch is bound to them and the host OS no longer has access.

As always, test this first before running a setup into production!

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer