Scale-Out File Server Cluster: Where Is the Witness Disk?

We were in a bit of a quandary as far as the how/what/where for a Witness Disk (quorum disk) for Scale-Out File Server (SOFS) cluster.

Our setup:

• (2) Intel Server Systems R2208GZ4GC
• Dual SAS HBAs, Dual Intel X540T2 10GbE
• Scale-Out File Server Nodes
• (2) Intel Storage Systems JBOD2224S2DP JBOD
• Mix of 10K SAS, 15K SAS, and SSD SAS drives mirrored in each JBOD
• (2) Intel Server Systems R2208GZ4GC
• Dual Intel X540T2 10GbE
• Hyper-V Nodes

In the case where we had a Hyper-V Failover Cluster using Direct Attached Storage via Promise VTrak E610sD dual SAS, Dell MD3220 dual SAS, or HP P2000 dual SAS we would set up a 1.5GB shared LUN for the quorum disk.

Well, in this case we don't have the logic in the storage to do that.

So, where do we put our Witness Disk for a SOFS based Storage Spaces cluster?

The only real clue we had was in Jose Barreto's blog post:

• Jose Barreto's Blog: Windows Server 2012 R2 Storage: Step-by-step with Storage Spaces, SMB Scale-Out and Shared VHDX (Physical)

Specifically this line in the Storage Spaces setup:

New-VirtualDisk -FriendlyName Space1 -StoragePoolFriendlyName Pool1 -ResiliencySettingName Mirror –Size 1GB

An e-mail to Jose asking about that command, and also an e-mail to my fellow Cluster MVPs, came back with Jose confirming that the 1GB Virtual Disk (Storage Space) would be used for the Witness Disk.

We have two options when it comes to configuring the disk. Either we set it up as per Jose's blog post and verify in Failover Cluster Management (FCM) that the Witness Disk is the allocated 1GB or we stand up the cluster, configure the 1GB Storage Space, and then designate the Witness Disk in FCM.

Further reading:

• Cluster and High-Availability Blog: Understanding Quorum in a Failover Cluster
• Ask Premier Field Engineering (PFE) Platforms Blog: Clustering: What exactly is a File Share Witness and when should I use one?

Thanks to Jose Barreto and my fellow Cluster MVPs that answered the N00b questions! :)

Philip Elder
Microsoft Cluster MVP
MPECS Inc.
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen ASP Project
Find out more at
Third Tier: Enterprise Solutions for Small Business

One Post SBS Configuration

We are doing the following and are quite successful with the setup:

• 2x Windows Server STD
• Windows CALs
• Exchange STD
• Exchange CALs
• RDS CALs

With that we set up one host with Hyper-V (2012 R2 preferred).

• VM 1: DC
• VM 2: Exchange 2013 CU3
• VM 3: RDS
• VM 4: LoB, WSUS

We just finished migrating our last SBS 2003 out to this setup (though with two servers and a few extra licenses).

For larger firms we can set up two identical servers and have licensing in place to allow for the following:

• Server 1 & 2: DC VM with DHCP Failover enabled (new 2012 R2 feature)
• Server 1: LoB VM with Replica to Server 2
• Server 1: Exchange
• Server 1: RDS VM with Replica to Server 2

Because Exchange and SQL have their own built-in redundancy features we have the option to configure in-guest clustering to build out the required redundancy for them.

Or, we can go with two servers with dual SAS HBAs and a dual controller SAS direct attached storage (MD3220, VTrak E610sD, DS3524) and set up an actual Hyper-V Failover Cluster. This option works very well for the very downtime conscious client.

Philip Elder
Microsoft Cluster MVP
MPECS Inc.
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
Third Tier: Enterprise Solutions for Small Business

Hyper-V: Set Up A Permanent Host OS Flash Drive

All of our Hyper-V hosts whether standalone or clustered 1U/2U nodes have a permanent flash drive plugged into the server.

They also have an Intel RMM, Dell iDRAC Enterprise, or HP iLO Advanced set up for full remote KVM over IP access.

We can then flatten and restore that host to production worthy status in about 30-45 minutes. PowerShell has a lot to do with the ability to make this happen as far as post OS configuration.

Here's how we do it:

1. DiskPart
1. List Disk
2. Select Disk x (flash)
3. Clean
4. Create Partition Primary
5. Select Partition 1
6. Format FS=NTFS Quick Label=”HV_Node-01”
7. Active
8. Assign
2. Have the host OS ISO mounted and copy its ENTIRE contents to the root of the flash drive.
3. We then create the following folders in the root of the flash drive:
1. _Drivers
2. _Utilities
3. _Software

What goes into those folders:

• Drivers = obvious
• Utilities = things like HVRemote, the bind tools, ETC
• Software = Server Management software

We _never_ back up the host. Period.

Once the host OS has been set up please make sure that having that USB flash drive permanently plugged in does not interfere with the host's boot process by verifying the boot order and USB boot settings in the BIOS.

Philip Elder
Microsoft Cluster MVP
MPECS Inc.
Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
Third Tier: Enterprise Solutions for Small Business

Date Stamp on Windows Server 2012 R2 Open License Media

We keep getting caught with dropping the early bits on a flash drive to load an OS. It's not hard to figure out as soon as the server boots from the USB flash drive as it requests an Activation Key.

Note the date stamp above is August September 30, 2013. That is the Open bits that will not prompt for a key.
The DVD media name:

• IR1_SSS_X64FREV_EN-US_DV5

UPDATE: Changed the month noted. :)

Philip Elder
Microsoft MVP
MPECS Inc.
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book
Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
Third Tier: Enterprise Solutions for Small Business

Hyper-V Cluster: An error occurred while creating the cluster: Unknown error (0xc0000133)

We had just finished walking through all of the steps to set up two nodes for a Server 2012 RTM Hyper-V cluster when we got hit with the following error:

Create Cluster Wizard

An error occurred while creating the cluster.

An error occurred while creating the cluster 'TD-12Cluster'.

Unknown error (0xc0000133)

Our initial searches turned up very little when we included Hyper-V and Cluster in our terms.

The error code however turned up a tie into time synchronization.

These nodes were set up using Windows Server 2012 Standard in Server Core mode. And, we had missed step 9 in SConfig: Date & Time!

The time zone was incorrect on both nodes.

We also noticed that the time on the test network was about 9 minutes out from our own. So, we had missed configuring the time service on the physical DC to poll the Canadian pool.ntp.org servers.

• Blog post here: Preparing A High Load VM For Time Skew
1. Elevate a command prompt
2. w32tm /config /syncfromflags:manual "/manualpeerlist:0.ca.pool.ntp.org,0x1 1.ca.pool.ntp.org,0x1 2.ca.pool.ntp.org,0x1 3.ca.pool.ntp.org,0x1"
3. w32tm /config /update
4. net stop w32time && net start w32time
5. w32tm /resync /force
6. w32tm /query /source
1. Should be 0.ca.pool.ntp.org

Once we had the domain time in order and the nodes synchronized to the DC we were able to successfully stand up the cluster in Failover Cluster Management.

In the end not referring to our process manuals was the key. ;)

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

A Small Windows Server 2012 Issue

This issue is by no means business critical or threatening to bring down a Hyper-V Cluster or the like.

However, someone somewhere in Quality Control seems to have missed the boat on selecting items in the Roles & Features wizard:

Note how there is a Check Mark that seemingly indicates the full Role feature set has been installed.

Yet, when we click into that option we get:

It seems to us that since there are features within that Role that have not been installed the top level indicator should be the same as the one beside File and iSCSI Services (Installed) no?

This may be a minor thing, but most certainly indicators should indicate the correct status.

We don’t have a Windows Server 2012 R2 version up and running right now so can’t compare the two. Hopefully this little oversight has been fixed in the soon to be released product.

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

Server 2012–Unidentified Network with Team Set As Public

This is a bit of a frustrating problem:

After setting up the team things were fine.

However, after a reboot the server has disappeared on the network.

After logging in we see that the team is active but the network is unidentified and the firewall is on Public:

Restart the Network Location Awareness service:

Then hit refresh in the Firewall MMC:

And refresh in NCPA.CPL (Network Connections):

It turns out that in situations where a Windows Server 2012 native NIC team is set up the Network Location Awareness service should be set to Automatic (Delayed Start) to give the team time to start!

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

Some Thoughts on the Need for a Physical DC for Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V Clusters

Introduced in Windows Server 2012 was the ability to cold-boot a Hyper-V cluster without a DC present outside of the cluster setup.

One still needs Active Directory up and running _prior_ to standing up a new cluster in a greenfield deployment but that is pretty much the only “requirement” as far as DCs and clusters go.

• Microsoft Support: KB 281662 How to use Windows Server cluster nodes as domain controllers

The above KB tells us that we can make an exception in that greenfield setup to actually DCPromo _all_ of the nodes prior to standing up the cluster. Then we have our AD and are good to go so to speak.

We, however, prefer to have a standalone DC in place prior to running a greenfield cluster setup or introduce a new physical server box with Windows Server Standard that will be DCPromod into the existing domain and remain after the existing server systems are retired.

Why do we do this?

• A separate/independent DC is needed for standing up a new cluster.
• We don’t support the idea of running a DCPromo on all of the nodes in a new cluster and then backing them out afterwards.
• DNS is absolutely critical when working on a cluster in a recovery/systems down situation.
• No DNS can mean no RSAT management of the nodes.
• AD can be needed for authentication purposes when making changes on the nodes.
• We don’t log into the nodes very often. So, in a setting where domain admin credentials change on a somewhat regular basis we could be locked out.
• Constrained Delegation for access to resources hosted elsewhere on the network can break without a live DC.
• No access to that recovery ISO that we needed yesterday. :(
• A physical DC is needed for high load VMs where timing gets skewed****.

For the cost of a small server and a Windows Server Standard license we can avoid so many headaches in the event that something goes wrong and we need to go into troubleshooting and recovery mode with our cluster.

Depending on the situation one can also build a fairly robust server configuration for that independent DC with a lot of storage. This is our preference where our cluster storage is fairly close to 100% utilized with dedicated LUNs for those VHD/VHDX files.

Then, if we run into a situation where an admin accidentally snapshots something and the VM goes Paused-Critical (previous blog post) we have some free storage to combine the AVHD and VHD files.

Keep in mind that we are talking about a two, three, or four node cluster running in a smaller setting where there may not be any other DCs present beyond the main office.

If there are branch offices with a local domain controller present one needs to carefully evaluate as to whether that standalone DC in the main office should be left out of the picture. Even in this type of situation we prefer to have an independent DC in the main office.

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

Server Core: PowerShell Install-WindowsFeature RSAT-Clustering Seems to Hang at 68%

On a Windows Server 2012 Core deploy we ran the following command:

• Install-WindowsFeature RSAT-Clustering

And we saw the following for a _long_ time!

The “Start Installation...” line kept blinking on and off all during the time it seemed to be stuck.

With a little bit of patience we eventually saw the following result:

The entire process took about 15-20 minutes.

So, be patient. ;)

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

A Storage Spaces and Hyper-V Cluster Lab Guide

Here is a good start for a lab environment:

• David Ziembicki: Cloud Computing | Virtualization | Microsoft Blog: Hyper-V and Scale-Out File Cluster Home Lab Design

A set of DAS JBOD units can used with two small nodes and 2 SAS based HBAs per node to stand up a Storage Spaces cluster using the Server 2012 R2 bits. A couple of MicroServer Gen8 boxes would round out the Hyper-V side of it.

On this blog there are a lot of configurations discussed that utilize intelligent direct attached storage.

• Basic setup
  • Intel Server System SR1695GPRX2AC pair with Promise VTrak E610sD or E310sD
  • This category search on the blog has a number of really good posts including configuration examples based on the SR1695GPRX2AC (blog category link)
    • This server unit has been our go-to for base configurations as it is an excellent and flexible platform
• Advanced setup
  • Intel Server System R2208GZ4GC pair with the Promise VTrak E610sD or E310sD
• All-Out Setup
  • All of the above plus LSI SAS 6160 Switch pair and Intel Modular Server with 3 nodes.

In the above setups the key is the intelligent storage providing mitigation services to the SAS HBAs and OS access to the central storage.

With the 2012 R2 bits we are going to put together a redundant JBOD setup for a Storage Spaces cluster. This is the next direction we are delving into as we can put together a small SS cluster for a very reasonable cost.

Today, we are working on the following (similar to David Ziembicki’s setup) setup for clustered Storage Spaces:

• Basic
  • Intel Server System R1208JP4OC with pair of SAS HBAs (RS25GB008) (2 nodes)
    • 32GB of ECC per node to start
  • Intel Storage System JBOD2224S2D2 JBOD2224S2DP Intel JBOD units (2 units)
    • JBOD is dual expander and dual port backplane
    • Seagate Savvio SAS drives are dual port
  • 1m SAS Cables (4)
  • Windows Server 2012 R2 beta – Storage Spaces Cluster Setup
  • Intel Server System R2208GZ4GC pair for Hyper-V nodes (we have had these in our lab for a year or so now).
    • 64GB to 128GB of ECC
  • Windows Server 2012 R2 beta or RTM – Hyper-V Nodes
• Advanced
  • Add a pair of 8-Port or 12-Port NETGEAR 10Gbit Ethernet switches
    • Ports on each NIC would be split between switches for redundancy
  • Add a pair of Dual-Port 10Gbit PCIe and/or I/O Module NICs to each node
    • 10Gbit Ethernet would SMBv3 Storage Spaces located VHDX
    • 10Gbit Ethernet would be for Live Migration Network
  • LSI SAS Switches (we have a pair of these in our lab setting)
  • Additional Intel JBOD units to test switches and scaling storage out

Using David Ziembicki’s setup though one would be able to start at the base level and put together a similar configuration on a budget.

An HP MicroServer Gen8 would make an excellent platform for testing as they are relatively inexpensive and have pretty close to the full Intel virtualization Acceleration feature set.

Note that the Sans Digital MS28X listed in his blog post splits drives 0-3 and 4-7 between the two available external SAS connections. That means that there is no ability to use this storage unit without an LSI SAS 6160 Switch pair (Sans Digital MS28X Quick Installation Guide PDF)!

However, the Sans Digital MS8X6 unit does support redundancy and therefore they could be used to test Storage Spaces clustering configurations (Sans Digital MS8X6 Quick Installation Guide PDF).

Of course, for the added functionality there will be an extra cost involved, however one could drop the LSI SAS Switch for a set of these units for about the cost of the original MS28X plus SAS Switch!

• Storage Spaces Cluster
  • Storage Spaces Node
    • Intel Xeon E3-1230
    • Intel Server Board S1200BTLSH
    • 16GB ECC
    • Intel Integrated RAID RMS2AF040
    • 120GB Intel 320 Series SSD (or small 10K SAS) RAID 1 pair for host OS
    • Quad-Port Intel Gigabit Server NIC PCIe
    • Intel certified chassis (whether Intel or other)
  • Storage
    • Sans Digital MS8X6
      • 300GB 15K 3.5" SAS drives can be found for a good deal today
  • Hyper-V Node
    • Intel Xeon E3-1230
    • Intel Server Board S1200BTLSH
    • 32GB ECC
    • Intel Integrated RAID RMS2AF040
    • 120GB Intel 320 Series SSD (or small 10K SAS) RAID 1 pair for host OS
    • Quad-Port Intel Gigabit Server NIC PCIe
    • Intel certified chassis (whether Intel or other)
  • OPTIONS
    • Add Intel RMM4 for full KVM over IP
    • Add Dual-Port 10Gbit Intel Ethernet for SMBv3 and Live Migration Networks
    • Add Intel Storage Systems JBOD2224S2DP at a later date for full SAS Dual Port Redundancy

There are so many different ways to go about this.

The main thing is to start small and work one’s way up to a full scale server grade lab as the jobs come in! That’s how we built our own lab systems up and how we built up the knowledgebase and experience!

EDIT: Oops, Star Wars on the mind. Intel Storage Systems part number should be JBOD2224S2DP (I had JBOD2224S2D2 above!). :)

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

Windows Server 2012 to RST RAID 0 Error: Windows can’t be installed on drive 0 partition 1 - and Others

We had the following errors when trying to install Windows Server 2012 onto a desktop setup:

Windows Setup

Windows cannot be installed to this disk. This computer’s hardware may not support booting to this disk. Ensure that the disk’s controller is enabled in the computer’s BIOS menu.

And then, after fiddling about with DiskPart we managed:

Windows Setup

We couldn’t install Windows in the location you chose. Please check your media drive. Here’s more info about what happened; 0x80300001.

Windows cannot be installed to this disk. This computer’s hardware may not support booting to this disk. Ensure that the disk’s controller is enabled in the computer’s BIOS menu.

The PC setup

• Intel DX79SR with Core i7 and 64GB RAM
• Intel RST RAID enabled and 6x 160GB Intel SSDs in RAID 0
• Primary SATA set to RAID
• Secondary SATA DISABLED in BIOS
• Boot order set correctly

Now, it is important to note that these SSDs have been in and out of various systems.

So, a last ditch effort:

1. Log into the RAID BIOS
2. Reset the disks to NON-RAID
3. Boot to WinPE
4. SHFT+F10
5. DiskPart
6. Select each SSD and CLEAN
7. Reboot
8. Log into RAID BIOS
9. Set up RAID 0
10. Boot to Windows Server 2012 Setup

We created our 120GB partition and did not see a single message.

So, rule of thumb: Clean each disk while in JBOD/Standalone mode with DiskPart before configuring the disks in a new host-based RAID setup (chipset RAID).

A hardware RAID setup would initialize the disks (use the deep/long initialization to run a full set of zeros across all platters/SSDs if problems happen) so we would not normally see this problem.

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

Capacity Planner for Hyper-V Replica

Found on Microsoft's Download site:

• Microsoft Downloads: Capacity Planner for Hyper-V Replica

We head on over and download both the executable as well as the Word document that accompanies it.

Then on to:

And finally:

Ooops. We are looking to assess a Hyper-V Replica that is set up and online already!

Well, like any good IT Professional the next step is to actually read that manual! ;)

Based on the FAQ later in the document we will need to run this tool against some VMs hosted on Server 2012.

So, the next step for us will be to run some tests against the required Hyper-V environment to get an idea of what the tool will be reporting.

More to come on that . . .

The link for this little tool comes to us via Susan Bradley the SBS Diva.

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

SMBKitchen Project Open Chat Today

We will be having an open chat with the SMBKitchen Authors this afternoon/evening at 1600Hrs Mountain (1800Hrs Eastern).

• Join Lync Meeting
• iCAL Download

Please make sure to use the full Lync client as the Web based client seems to not pick up audio streaming properly.

The feedback on my How-To video for setting up Hyper-V on Windows 8 as well as a greenfield VM based DC with DNS and DHCP along with setting up the Hyper-V networking and a 2008 R2 Standard VM as a router.

I go through step-by-step for setting up the vSwitches, NIC(s) on the VMs, installing and configuring the operating systems, and then finally setting up AD/DNS/DHCP on the 2012 VM and RRAS in NAT mode on the 2008 R2 VM.

We will discuss our current content along with the content we should be posting over this coming month.

This chat is open to everyone both subscribers and not.

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

RDP Client in Windows 8 and Server 2012 Neat Features

While working from a Windows 8 Enterprise system here in the shop we connected remotely to a Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V environment that we are in the process of setting up for a new client.

A couple of neat new features in the MSTSC (Click Start (WINKey+R) –> Run –> mstsc [Enter]), that is the Microsoft Remote Desktop Connection Client (MicroSoft Terminal Services Client) are the following:

There is a little drop down menu available on the far left of the RDP status bar at the top of the session that gives us access to Windows 8/Server 2012 specific features.

The other thing we noticed was the “wireless” status bars to the right of the Pin.

Click on that and we see the following:

The drop down menu will certainly be handy for windowed RDP sessions since that is how we run most of our remote management sessions.

The connection status bars not so much. It is pretty obvious when we are having connection issues.

Have a great day and thanks for reading! :)

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

HP Smart Array P420i: Post Disk Add To Array Logical Drive Changes

Now that the P420i has finished incorporating four new disks into our HP ML350p G8’s RAID 10 setup we now see the option to extend the existing logical drive on the RAID 10 array:

We click on the Extend Logical Drive button and we see:

Since we already have fixed VHDX files on the existing logical drive that cover almost 500GB we are not going to shuffle the setup. We will extend the existing partition the full amount available to us.

Once that process has completed we will jump into Windows Server Drive Management and extend the existing OS partition.

When we click the Save button we get this interesting warning:

About ten to thirteen years out of date, but possibly applicable somewhere. :)

The process was surprisingly quick.

After hitting Rescan Disks in Disk Management we saw:

A quick couple of clicks and we had:

Now to rework the necessary VHDX files in Hyper-V Manager after shutting down the VMs.

All in all this process turned out to be a simple one.

Prior to making these changes we made sure to back up our guests just in case the process caused a failure.

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

A little fun with the Microsoft Surface Pro: Desktop Data Centre

This is a pretty neat video and highlights the new Hyper-V Shared Nothing Live Migration in Windows Server 2012 on a set of four _Microsoft Surface Pro_ devices.

Surface Pro Tabletop Data Centre

The original blog post on the Building Clouds blog:

• Surface Pro Hijinks: The Video

This setup certainly gives us food for thought as far as some of the virtualization options that we can offer for our SMB/SME clients.

Take things one step further with a failover cluster and we have resource redundancy as opposed to resource portability.

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

HP P420i Smart Array: Adding 4 New Disks to a RAID 10 Array

We started off with a new HP ML350p G8 that our now client had purchased.

We had the RAM bumped up to 128GB and then suggested changing the existing 4 disk RAID 10 plus hot spare into a RAID 6 array across 8 disks.

We managed to secure the additional three disks for the task but for now we will hold off on RAID 6 as that requires a "feature activation license" according to HP.

We start by opening the HP System Management Homepage.

We then click on the Storage icon.

Next up is the Array Configuration Utility (ACU).

We then select the P420i Smart Array controller.

We then get a list showing any available disks, in this case 3, and the array we plan on expanding.

The fourth disk we plan on adding to this array is actually the current Global Hot Spare.

We can't see the hot spare in Logical View so we change to Physical View.

Click on the SAS Array A with Spare and we see the following options.

Click on Spare Management and we see:

We unselected the spare drive and chose Save near the bottom right.

We not longer had a Global Hot Spare.

Making sure that SAS Array A is selected we clicked on the Expand Array option.

We clicked the Select All (4 Drives) check and clicked Save.

Our status changed immediately:

We click on the View Status Alerts link to see what the exclamation mark is all about.

So, we have not cache while the RAID array is in the process of changing.

It took a few clicks to figure out where the status report was for the ongoing change. It's under Logical View.

We ran a timer for 1% to see what kind of time we were looking at and the result was about a minute and a half. So, about three to four hours for the initial step to be completed.

Hopefully once this process has completed we will be able to expand the existing array. We shall see...

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

Exchange 2013: Outlook Anywhere Shows Mailbox GUID

This is interesting:

We are in the process of finishing up a bunch of remote mailbox setup on Outlook 2010 for a client with a Greenfield Windows Server 2012 Essentials and on-premises Exchange 2013 Standard setup.

It seems that instead of representing the server name Exchange 2013 likes to drop the mailbox GUID into that spot.

Nothing out of the ordinary is happening mail wise, we just thought it was interesting that we no longer see MailboxServer.Domain.Local as the indicated server name.

Nothing to see here, move along folks! ;)

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

HP Smart Array P420i Controller – Caveat: Need Flash Based Cache to Make Any Online Array Changes

We are in the process of setting up a Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V host with two server operating system guests, one DC and one RDS, and a couple of desktop operating system guests.

We were brought in to set up the environment at the hardware vendor’s request. So, this box was set up prior to our jumping in.

Since we do not work with HP servers on a regular basis we are not up on their terminology nor product features throughout their server lines.

We are in the process of looking into filling up the 2.5” hot swap drive bays as the server came configured with a RAID 10 (RAID 1+0) array and one global hot spare.

• HP Smart Array P420i Controller QuickSpecs Page

Having worked with Intel RAID Controllers most of the time as well as LSI RAID controllers we have come to expect advanced features to work out of the box. This is primarily due to the fact that we run with mainstream series or high performance series RAID controllers out of the box.

We avoid entry level if at all possible.

As we have discovered today, this is one reason why:

Note the following:

• Modular, easy-to-upgrade design lets you optimize performance by upgrading from 40-bit 512MB cache to 72-bit 1GB Flash Backed Write Cache or 72-bit 2GB Flash Backed Write Cache (FBWC).
• Addition of the flash backed cache upgrade enables array expansion, logical drive extension, RAID migration, and stripe size migration.

Obviously the emphasis is ours.

So, we are now in a position where we need to find out the cost on the 1GB and 2GB FBWC options for this particular server.

We are not sure what that cost will be but it will probably beat out our having to back up the entire server and its guests, that are already set up for production, and restoring the box using our ShadowProtect IT Edition license.

The clue that something was up came via the HP management utility that showed the following for the current RAID array configuration:

Note the distinct absence of RAID 6.

Apparently there is a license key that enables RAID 6 in this particular controller.

So, we hit two caveats with this setup:

• Flash based Cache is required for advanced RAID features.
• A license pack is required to enable RAID 6.

Ever try to purchase a base model car and add _just_ the features needed like cruise/tilt/air and a decent stereo and end up more expensive that the “LX” version of that vehicle?

It has been a disappointing trend in our industry to no longer be able to configure a Tier 1 server system, desktop system, or workstation system without having to knew the bits and pieces that these systems are made up of. We used to be able to configure systems that would just work as we expect them to and have the features we would expect for the price we paid.

Also, it has been our experience that the Tier 1 sales folks that _know_ these bits and pieces are very hard come-by with the onus being on us to make sure we have our ducks lined up _before_ we initiate contact.

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

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

Server 2012/Windows 8: A Couple of Quick Logoff and Reboot Tips

We have a quick way to log off a Windows 2012 server or Windows 8 machine:

1. Hit Start –> type: Logoff
2. Right click on Logoff and Pin To Start
• 
• Above snip is _after_ pinning.
3. ESC
4. Start
5. Move the Logoff tile to the Top Left of the Start menu.
• 

Once the above process is complete to log off a server or desktop set up as above we hit Start then [Enter] and we are logged off.

To reboot or shut down the system we do the following:

1. WIN+R
1. shutdown –r –t 0 –f
1. Reboot, time is 0 seconds, and force the reboot.
2. shutdown –s –t 0 –f
1. Shut down, time is 0 seconds, and force the reboot.

The Run command can otherwise be pinned to the Start menu using the above methodology.

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

Windows Live Writer