Posted by uspensky on 04/12/06 19:31

We are trying to setup a system to system failover cluster using two
nodes (x346) which each have a single hba running to seperate
controllers on the DS400.

For full redundnancy, IBM recommends dual path from each node but we
dont need that. The current setup has two completly seperate paths. hba
on node 1 to controller A on DS400 and hba on node 2 to controller B.
If i take a controller offline, failover works fine to jumo to other
controller and throw all resources to it's node but if i shutdown a
node- the cluster loses all attached storage and DS400 is unaware to
switch ownership to other controller.

Is there a way to us mscs without dual path from each node?
anotherwords... if either node or controller fails on a single path, we
want the other path to become active.

our main goal is to use sql server 2005 clustering on the cluster.
everything checks out perfect if i only use one controller on the DS400
for both nodes but this brings us back to another single point of
failure.

I saw that Qlogic has MPIO drivers on thir website for the DS400 but it
seems as though they are for 32bit systems and the install errors out
with:

C:\Drivers\mpio\1.0.8.4 (w32)>install.exe -i
Pre-Installing the Multi-Path Adapter Filter...
Success
Installing the Multi-Path Bus Driver...
Failure. Error code (0xe0000235)

configuration:
2 X IBM x346 w/ single QLogic 2340 HBAs running win2k3 64bit Enterprise
DS400 w/ dual controllers

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