clustering info?

From: Exotic-Scales.com (jb_at_NOSPAM.exotic-scales.com)
Date: 10/05/04 

Date: Tue, 5 Oct 2004 19:46:30 -0400

Hi all,

    I'm an old DEC guy, so I'm familiar with the concept of clustering; I'm
just not sure how/if I should implement it in my own environment.

    I have what is probably a fairly sophisticated network for home use.
Right now I'm using an NT4.0 domain controller, with 3 XP Professional
clients. I'm hosting 4 web sites on my domain server (which is an old
Gateway Pentium266), as well as Exchange Server, and SQL Server. (Believe
it or not, everything works quite well for my purposes). Recently, we
picked up three new machines for myself, my wife, and my daughter, so I'm
looking at how best to redeploy my old boxes, which consist of a Dell
Pentium-II 45o with 512 Meg, and an ultra-wide/ultra-fast 10,000 rpm SCSI
drive, two CTX boxes with AMD K6 350 & 168 Meg, and the aforementioned
Gateway, which I may or may not use.

I have a volume license version of Windows 2003 Enterprise Server, as well
as Exchange 2003.

I have my websites running on the Gateway, which has 2 network cards -- one
attaches to my Netgear firewall, the other to my internal network. I've
tried getting the websites to run on other machines on my internal network,
without success, so I'm assuming that I have to run them on the box whose
second network card goes to the uplink. (If it isn't obvious, I really
don't know what the hell I'm doing -- I'm a coder, not an administrator!) I
was thinking of maybe putting a second network card in the Gateway 450, and
setting it up as a dedicated web server, and using one of the CTX boxes as a
dedicated Exchange Server, and the other as my domain controller.

I was wondering, however, how I might do this using clustering. What I'd
LIKE to have happen is a configuration where my websites would load-balance,
and if any of my machines went down, my sites and email would stay up, but
I'm not sure how to set that up. Would I have to install dual cards in all
three machines, and link them directly to my firewall/switch? Would I
install mirror images of all the software on all 3 machines? Am I doing way
overboard for what I really need?

Thanks.

Joe
http://www.exotic-scales.com

Relevant Pages

  • Losing network shares across multiple machines on Windows 2003
    ... backup domain controller. ... while all other machines can continue to happily use the network. ... Network shares map to more than just one file server - ie, ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.general)
  • Re: [SLE] Sharing Dial Up Connection
    ... It's not too hard to do, and SusE and yast make it easier. ... Only do this on the server. ... - In the client machines, use the network card setup to add the server's ...
    (SuSE)
  • Re: domain controller?
    ... > We run a small network, about 14 machines. ... > look into setting up a domain controller. ... Any PC that meets the specs can be a Windows Server DC. ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.help_and_support)
  • WMI Access Denied when incorrect DNS search order
    ... perform remote WMI enquiries on 2 machines on the W2K3 domain and 1 ... machine that is a standalone server. ... I noticed however that the DNS search order was going to the gateway ... sometimes the domain controller ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.active_directory)
  • Re: Joining Domain Across Subnets
    ... concerning the joining of the machines see: ... The new server isn't going to be a DNS server so do I need zone transfers ... Host records that map the name of the domain controller to its IP ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.server.active_directory)