I cannot configure second node in cluster - The system cannot find the file specified

[Jan-Willem]

I am trying to install a cluster with windows 2000 advanced server
servicepack 3.

I can succesfully install the first node and create a cluster with ip
address and shared folders. However if i try to install the second
node i get an error.

Both server have 1 ide disk (which the OS is on) and both have 1
internal scsi disk (which will contain the data) and is connected on a
Adaptec SCSI controller. Both scsi disks are basic disks whith a NTFS
formatted primary paritition. Both bootdisks are drive C, both scsi
disks are Disk D. Both cd-rom drives are F. But when i use the wizard
on the second node to configure it following happens:
- I have to access the cluster, which i can do successfully
- I have to login which I can do successfully too
- But when i finish the the wizard, it says Drive D is already in use
and that i should use disk manager to change the drive letter before
bringing the service online, because else the service will do that and
applications could fail to run. However this d-disk is the scsi disk
which is empty and should be used for the cluster. This error is
followed by: The system cannot find the file specified.

When i look in the cluster administrator this resource (d-disk) had
been made, but is off line and has a exclamation with it. When i look
in the properties, the selected drive d is no longer selected, but the
field is empy.

When i delete this object en create a new resource and choose for
physical disk, name it en select the empty d-drive again, i still get
the message: The system cannot find the file specified Error 2
(00000002).

What can i do???
By the way, it is possible though to have an internal scsi harddisk in
both servers and both containing the date saved on the cluster (kind
of mirroring) or does it has to be an external drive??? think not...

Please help me.
Kind regards.
Jan-Willem Koenraad
MC-Data bv NL

 

[Curtis Koenig [MSFT]]

Hi Jan,
The basic problem is this is not really a cluster configuration. Cluster
requires that the two servers be connected to a shared external storage of
some type, this can be an external SCSI storage or a SAN. The configuration
as described is not valid for clustering, clustering is not designed to
"mirror" the data to different SCSI drives in different computers.
Clustering allows the nodes to share a single external storage drive for
the purpose of fail-over and thus they data is not copied or mirrored, it
is just written to the drive that both nodes can access.

The other problem that may be occurring is that not all SCSI controllers
can act as cluster storage access devices. The SCSI controllers must
support a specific subset of SCSI commands that allow clustering to take
place. So just having SCSI disks and SCSI controllers will not create a
cluster or allow one to be created.

--
Curtis Koenig
Support Professional
Microsoft Clustering Technologies Support

Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer
Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer - Security

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties and confers no rights.
Please reply to the newsgroup so that others may benefit. Thanks!

--------------------

 

[Jan-Willem]

Curtis,

Thank you for your information. But we called microsoft if this
configuration is possible and they said yes.... hmmm...

Then, is there any other solution for this problem?
because a san can fail as well.
For me the ideal configuration would be, two identical servers (which
i have) which will synchronize each other. So if one fails, the other
one takes it over, including data. Perhaps an options is mirroring.
But then the following problem exists i think: both servers have
differtent names and ip numbers, so if I configure server one as
server01 at 192.168.1.1 and second server as server02 192.168.1.1 and
i configure applications etc, and server01 goes down, server two
cannot take it over, because of different names and ipnummers, or can
i create a third virtual server.

To be short, how can i do this with this current configuration i have
now, because a san can fail as well?
Is it possible to add a second san, which mirrors the first one?
Basically, if one server fails totally, the network must be kept
online...
Any other options?

Thanks in advance!
Jan-Willem Koenraad
MC-Data bv NL

 

[Curtis Koenig [MSFT]]

Yes a SAN can fail and you can have 2 SANS attached to the same cluster but
any mirroring is not a Microsoft supported solution. What you are looking
for is what cluster is supposed to do. You have external storage that is
hooked to two nodes and if one of the nodes fails the other takes over. As
for SAN or storage failures the only way to mitigate them is to have a good
backup strategy.

If your curious about "supported" cluster configurations the following KB
explains our support limitations:
812504 Network-Attached Storage and Server Cluster Support
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=812504

Only cluster solutions that are in the Windows Hardware Catalog are
supported.
--
Curtis Koenig
Support Professional
Microsoft Clustering Technologies Support

Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer
Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer - Security

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties and confers no rights.
Please reply to the newsgroup so that others may benefit. Thanks!

--------------------