Clustering Exchange 2003

Clustering Exchange 2003 Consulting Services

After deploying Microsoft® Exchange Server 2003 in a cluster, correct management of that cluster ensures high availability of your servers that are running Exchange. One important part of managing your Exchange Server clusters is the customization of your cluster configuration, including management of your Exchange Virtual Servers and cluster nodes. For example, you may want to add functionality to the default cluster configuration, such as enabling Internet Message Access Protocol version 4 (IMAP4) or Post Office Protocol version 3 (POP3) access for your users. Other important management tasks include monitoring the performance of Exchange 2003 clusters, troubleshooting problems when they occur, and perhaps rebuilding a server or restoring your databases from backup.

Before you start managing your Exchange cluster, you may want to review what constitutes an Exchange Virtual Server and its associated Exchange resources. You may also want to become more familiar with Cluster Administrator—the primary tool used to configure and manage clusters.

 
For the latest information about Clustering Exchange 2003

 

Reviewing Exchange Clusters

Exchange clusters are made up of physical computers (nodes) and logical Exchange Virtual Servers (see Figure 8.1). Exchange Virtual Servers are Microsoft Windows® cluster groups with Exchange resources (instances of Exchange services). Exchange Virtual Servers are the basic units of failover for your cluster.

  

For the latest information about Reviewing Exchange Clusters
 

 

How Failover Works in an Exchange Cluster

In an active/passive cluster, such as the 3-active/1-passive cluster shown below, there are three Exchange Virtual Servers: EVS1, EVS2, and EVS3. This configuration can handle a single node failure at a time and still maintain 100 percent availability after a failure occurs. That is, if Node 3 fails, Node 1 still owns EVS1, Node 2 still owns EVS2, and Node 4 takes ownership of EVS3 with all the storage groups mounted after the failure. However, if a second node fails while Node 3 is still down, the Exchange Virtual Server associated with the second failed node remains in a failed state because there is no stand-by node available for failover.

 

For the latest information about How Failover Works in an Exchange Cluster

 

 

 

Clustering Exchange 2003 Windows Server | Exchange Server | Clustering Windows | Exchange Server | Exchange Security | Clustering SQL | Clustering Veritas | Clustering Linux | Clustering Server | Clustering Exchange | Clustering Computing | Clustering Documents |