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Best solution for heartbeat network in VMware for Windows 2008 cluster

I am currently working on setting up a Windows Server 2008 cluster for SQL 2008. I have 5 hosts and would like to be able to use HA, DRS, and vMotion. With that said I will need a heartbeat between them. Unfortunately I don't have full control over the hardware because it is managed, if I did I would use a NIC on each into a VLAN for everything, that probably is not possible.

So with that said, I am looking for suggestions on how to get a network connection across all these systems for a heartbeat network.

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Danny McDaniel

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ThorinO

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That is what I was thinking a minute ago. They do VLAN us off. So if I create another VM port group on vSwitch0 and call it say "Heartbeat" and put those 2 NICs on there it should isolate them from the data traffic right?

I know it isn't the cleanest setup but it is what I have to work with.

Danny McDaniel

yeah, I think that should work. If they restrict the switch ports to only accept traffic on say, VLAN 70, as long as you're setup to use VLAN 70 it won't matter what network you use for that portgroup as long as all systems use the same subnet. Then it comes down to whether your links are trunked or not, but that will need to be known for general network setup anyways.

ThorinO

ASKER

They are trunked, so, I think that would not make much of a difference since they would both be on the same vSwitch, and physical NICs.

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ThorinO

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ThorinO

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Thanks