Windows 2008 Cluster Setup Step by step

 
A failover cluster is a group of independent computers that work together to increase the availability of applications and services. The clustered servers (called nodes) are connected by physical cables and by software. If one of the cluster nodes fails, another node begins to provide service (a process known as failover). Users experience a minimum of disruptions in service.
I have presented the storage as below. Need to say that if your two cluster server are separate Hosts then you have a way of presenting the same Volumes in to both Host. I have tried this because of the current requirement and I work fine. but this will not going to give you the full functions of the Cluster Service. because of that it’s better to have to present two different volumes from different clusters.
Storage volumes or logical unit numbers (LUNs) exposed to the nodes in a cluster must not be exposed to other servers, including servers in another cluster. The following diagram illustrates this.

 
First you need to present the the Luns. If your to host are physical you can easily do this and if you are using virtual environment, then you need to go with Raw device mapping. when you are doing this its better to map those volume in new SCSI Controller and change the policy as physical.

Then you can go in to Server manager and add a new feature.

Select the Failover Clustering from there and click next.

Click Install

In you both host you need to have two network interfaces and one is for the heartbeat and other one is for the management. 

As you can see below I have configured two different networks and Public network is having access to the production and HB network is only between those two host.
          
Once you done with that you can go to Failover Cluster manager and do the clustering.

Select Create new Cluster.

Click next.

Then you can add the cluster nodes by searching in the thee active directory. Select both the node and click next to proceed.

You can run the Validation testing to check whether there is any issue in those Nodes.


Select Run All Test to get a clear picture on the configuration.



Here I have got an error saying that one of the Cluster disk is having FAT 32 file system. I have formatted that in NTFAS and ran the test again.

Next page you can give the cluster name and the Cluster IP address which is common to the both the Nodes. then click next to get the configuration  information.

 


Once you click on the View Report. you will get the details about the task and now you will able work with the

This is the shortest steps that you can follow to create a Windows Cluster. now you can do some testing by creating some folders in one node and shutting down the nodes.

Active Directory Backup and Recovery Step-by-Step

  You can also restore Active Directory information on a domain controller by restoring the System State data from backup media. This restores Active Directory as well as the other System State components on which Active Directory depends. There are two general methods for restoring Active Directory from backup media. those are,
1. nonauthoritative .
2. authoritative.
Nonauthoritative restore means that when a domain controller is restored from backup media, the restored data is updated through normal replication. Each restored directory partition is updated with that of its replication partners.
Authoritative restore means that after Active Directory is restored nonauthoritatively from a backup medium that the entire directory, a subtree, or individual objects can be designated to take precedence over any other instances of those objects on replicated domain controllers. So, through normal replication, the restored domain controller becomes authoritative in relation to its replication partners. Even if the authoritatively restored replica set is older than the current replicas, the older data is replicated to all of its replication partners. Authoritative restore is typically used to restore a system to a previously known state,
 
Here I'm going to use Nonauthoritatively Restoring Active Directory technique. for that we can use Windows Server backup tool.
Fist you can follow below mentioned steps to enable windows backup feature.
Go to Roles and services



Select windows Server backup Feature 
 



Once you done with the installation you can open Windows Server backup Tool.

Then you can configure new backup  job. here I'm going to select “Backup Once” option. 

It’s good to have full server backup with us. because of that I'm selecting Full Server. 

I’m going to keep the backup in a remote location and i have already shared a folder for that. Here I’m giving the path of the Share folder. 
You can give permission for this backup file. 



 
To restore, You can select the backup job and from the action pane select Recover




Here you can elect the file and the folders that you want to recover.

You can select the recovery location as Original location or else you can say that Recovered that toy another location.

Once you click recover file will be recovered to the location that you have selected before.

SCCM2012 Client Installation Error

When you try to install SCCM client, If you install the SCCM for first time and you have not configured your Boundary groups then you will get the below mentioned error
Error: Some of the selected resources are not assigned to any site

To resolve this Go in to Admiration > Boundary Groups > Then select Create new Boundary Group

Give a Name for the new boundary group and add the boundaries in the second window.

Go to References and Select
1. Use the boundary group for the site assignment
2. Assign the site from the drop down box
3. Add the Site system Server

Click ok to continue.  Once you finished with that you can go to devices and try to Install Client

 

SCCM2012 Installation Error

 
When you try to configure SCCM 2012 with SQL 2012 sometime you will get the below mentioned error message.
“The logon account for the SQL Server service cannot be a local user account, NT SERVICE\<sql service name> or LOCAL SERVICE. You must configure the SQL Server service to use a valid domain account, NETWORK SERVICE, or LOCAL SYSTEM.”

To troubleshoot this you can follow the below mentioned steps.
Go in to SQL 2012 Server, click Start > SQL Server Configuration Manager

Then Click SQL Server Services > in the right window pane, right-click SQL Server <instance name>, click Properties

Click the Log On tab, click “This account”, click browse then select the AD account which you have created before with the Password.

Once you done with that, Re-run the Prerequisite Check for SCCM 2012 and validate that you do not see the prerequisite for SQL Server service as a warning or failure.