Highly-Available SQL Server with reliable Disaster Recovery is traditionally hard to achieve but necessary to have. We say it is possible to build a fully redundant SQL Server 2014 cluster with just 2 servers, StarWind Virtual SAN and Cluster Shared Volumes while implementing disaster recovery to several places with minimal RTO and RPO!

1. Webinar
Critical SQL Server Databases:
Provide HA with SQL Server Failover
Clustering and Cluster Shared Volumes

2. Edwin Sarmiento
http://www.EdwinMSarmiento.com
edwin@EdwinMSarmiento.com
@EdwinMSarmiento
http://ca.linkedin.com/in/EdwinMSa
rmiento
Microsoft MVP/Microsoft Certified Master:

4. high
availability

5. high
availability
characteristic of a system that is
full y oper ational
for a long period of time

6. high
availability
is NOT the same as
UPTIME

7. Just because
something is
UP
doesn’t mean it’s
available
UP
available

8. Recovery Time Objective
(RTO)
high
availability
When is my application coming back?

9. downtime
high ZERO

10. (one
“nine”)
% availability
90
36.5 days
per year
72 hours
per month
16.8 hours
per week
downtime

11. (two
“nines”)
% availability
99
3.65 days
per year
7.2 hours
per month
1.68 hours
per week
downtime

12. (three
“nines”)
% availability
99.9
8.76 hours
per year
43.8 minutes
per month
10.1 minutes
per week
downtime

13. (four
“nines”)
% availability
99.99
52.56
minutesper year
4.32 minutes
per month
1.01 minutes
per week
downtime

14. (five
“nines”)
% availability
99.999
5.26 minutes
per year
25.9 seconds
per month
6.05 seconds
per week
downtime

15. (five
“nines”)
% availability
99.999
5.26 minutes
per year
25.9 seconds
per month
6.05 seconds
per week
downtime
How long does it
take to
restart
S Q L
S e r ver

16. 0
10000
20000
30000
40000
50000
60000
70000
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
Cost
Time
Availability/RTO versus Total Cost of Ownership

17. downtime
high ZERO

18. features
high
availability

19. https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc645993.aspx#High_availability

20. ALWAYSON AVAILABILITY
GROUPS

21. introduced in SQL Server 2012
ALWAYSON AVAILABILITY
GROUPS
*DATABASE (group) protection

22. can either be an HA and/or DR solution
ALWAYSON AVAILABILITY
GROUPS
*DATABASE (group) protection

23. combination of
DATABASE MIRRORING
&
FAILOVER CLUSTERING
ALWAYSON AVAILABILITY
GROUPS

24. SQL Server
log data
SQL Server
log data
Secondary ReplicaPrimary
Replica
SQL Server
log data
Secondary Repli
*maximum of EIGHT replicas
Windows Server Failover Cluster
Database Mirroring

25. challenge
Availability Group
SQL Server
Enterprise Edition
requires

26. FAILOVER CLUSTERING

27. *INSTANCE protection
FAILOVER CLUSTERING
can either be an HA and/or DR solution

28. log data
failover
clustering
how it works
Windows Server Failover Cluster
SQL Server
2-node cluster
t r a d i t i o n
a l

29. failover
clustering
how it works
Windows Server Failover Cluster
SQL Server
Application
2-node cluster
t r a d i t i o n
a l
log data

30. Windows Server Failover Cluster
shared disks containing an NTFS
or ReFS volume that is made
accessible for read and write
operations by all nodes of WSFC
cluster shared
volumes*
we will only focus on Windows Server 2012 +
SQL Server

31. Windows Server Failover Cluster
failover
let’s look at
in the context of the
storage
SQL Server

32. Windows Server Failover Cluster
the storage is owned by
I/O workload only goes thru that single path to the
storage
onlyoneclusternode
atatime
SQL Server

33. Windows Server Failover Cluster
SQL Server
AD/DNS
during failover, the storage gets
“logically” dismounted from the
failed node and remounted on the
new active/primary node

34. Windows Server Failover Cluster
SQL Server
AD/DNS
the amount of time it takes to
bring the storage online
depends on how long it takes to
mount the storage to the new
active/primary node

35. SQL Server
Windows Server Failover Cluster
SQL Server
with CSV, there are now
multiple paths to the storage
I/O workload can be routed thru different paths to the
storage

36. Windows Server Failover Cluster
SQL Server
with CSV, no need to remount
storage on new active/primary
node after failover
this reduces downtime, increases resiliency and
reliability
SQL Server

37. Windows Server Failover Cluster
with CSV, no more
23 drive letter limitations
this means you no longer have to memorize the
alphabet in terms of failover cluster drives
SQL ServerSQL Server

38. Windows Server Failover Cluster
with CSV, the concept of
*this means that SQL Server failover clustered
instances
no longer has a direct dependency
on the shared drive to come online
exclusiveownership
ofstorage
is redefined
SQL ServerSQL Server

39. failover
clustering
how it works
Windows Server Failover Cluster
2-node cluster
t r a d i t i o n
a l
Application
*can be implemented with
SQL Server
Standard Edition
log data
SQL Server

40. failover
clustering
how it works
Windows Server Failover Cluster
2-node cluster
t r a d i t i o n
a l
Application
*can be implemented with
SQL Server
Standard Edition
log data log data
HA
SQL Server

41. What does StarWind Virtual SAN change?
StarWind Virtual SAN turns local storage into fault tolerant CSV for the local SQL cluster

42. •Deployment price is reduced ~3 times
•Maximized performance because of short IO path
•Disk, RAM, and Flash FT without Enterprise SQL licensing
Benefits compared to native clustering

43. demo
Configure SQL Server 2014
Failover Clustered Instances to
use Cluster Shared Volumes

44. Edwin Sarmiento
http://www.EdwinMSarmiento.com
edwin@EdwinMSarmiento.com
@EdwinMSarmiento
http://ca.linkedin.com/in/EdwinMSa
rmiento
Microsoft MVP/Microsoft Certified Master: