EDIT: Just to be clear when I first started the troubleshooting I had 1 problem. After the first problem cleared I encountered with the second problem. So if you skim through the thread you may get confused very quickly.

I have been trying to configure a vSAN by StarWind with 2 node for the past weeks. With multiple guides and help from the community, still I cannot test LIVE MIGRATION. Quick Migration does works so I do not quite understand Why?

note: Quick Migration works. Force migration via restarting the server works. Live Migration failed confused

From my initial research I know the cause is probably something to do with setting or naming. Something is not identical and is causing the failure between the node. I configure the server mirroring each other from scratch and still the problem exist.

Here are some screenshots. Hopes it helps to narrow down the cause

Too bad we heard of xByte weeks later after we purchased a server from Dell rep. But we are replacing our drives with xByte Edge pretty soon so looking forward to doing business with xByte. Keep it up!

@scottalanmiller said in Is it bashing to ask what other were thinking:

@MattSpeller said in Is it bashing to ask what other were thinking:

@thwr said in Is it bashing to ask what other were thinking:

@MattSpeller said in Is it bashing to ask what other were thinking:

@DustinB3403 said in Is it bashing to ask what other were thinking:

Yet I don't feel that we've bashed, we've discussed their topics, and how to address the issues / initially configure the issues.

This has been one of the exceptionally few things that bothers me about this forum. For my two cents I think we should keep the cross linking to a bare minimum and for interesting / news topics only. It does not "feel right" most of the time when I read about posts from there.

This community can be a little... predatory... on the folks less experienced in IT. Well intentioned, absolutely. But a little vicious to the unwary.

Well, this very community IS IT. Also, ML's NodeBB is a very fast paced system, that's another problem / feature.

To take up some cludges for @DustinB3403, it was not him alone. We're all shaking our heads about all the quiz questions, @Dashrender called it "beating a dead horse", just for example.

It's very fast paced and ruthless - which is I think some of this place's best qualities. Just need to be careful we don't "eat our young" as it were.

Very true. No doubt that the pace is the strength. But boy does it put pressure on new posters. Especially if they are used to a slow platform and have no idea that things are basically instant.

If you are used to communities where responses wait for emails to go out on a schedule, then people respond eventually... this place is SO different.

I posted a simple question about SSL certs, and expecting 5-6 replies, but I got A LOT more than I bargain for. In the end I learn of other services, certbot, that answer my question in a different way.

EDIT: let's try not to sidetrack from original topic here. Fastpace forum discussion can be a whole thread by itself.

@scottalanmiller

@MattSpeller

If you are opening a new thread can you link me to it. I would love to get involve

I just spoke with my manager, the CEO, and it is set for upgrade in Q3.

As a sole admin, I have no problem using built-in administrator to remote into each server. Next month I will have one more administrator joining. However, his role will be IT Manager, oversee me and web/app designer.
With that said... what is a recommended best practices when there are multiple administrator? Do I add him into Administrators group and be done with it?

Here's the changes:
Built-in Administrator : Change password.
I created a new account with @brianlittlejohn suggestion and made it domain admin.
Same with the new manager.

Thanks

So I was tasked to renew our certificate, and was instructed to get Wildcard cert. Any idea where I can get them from? I never done this before so treat me as an amateur for this matter.

Here is something I found online from Trustwave.
https://ssl.trustwave.com/ssl-premium-ev.php
https://ssl.trustwave.com/ssl-premium-wildcard.php

But when compared to Digicert's wildcard I feel like I am missing something important factor here.
https://www.digicert.com/welcome/wildcard-plus-compared.htm

Sole admin to 50-125 users. Feeling great to be here.

EDIT: For those that wander in... the answer is YES! Hyper-V is capable of High availability but not by itself. You will need a DAS, SAN, or vSAN for storage.

Most cluster are in 2 nodes for SMB. The settings will involve Hyper V server 2012 R2 + storage. The ideal is to have the Hyper-V run off separate storage (SD CARD or USB) and have VM VHD reside on the storage. With proper configuration on Failover the VM should spin up within seconds the moment heartbeat detected the other server has failed. YES there is downtime but it is very minimal and as the price tag of [FREE] you cannot argue with it. If you need zero downtime then you will need a much more HA or redundancy solution which will cost you more $$$ Cheers!

Original post:
[This is the post I posted on Spiceworks. I like to expand the feedback so per SAM suggestion here is the original post]

This debate has been going on forever and I have seen multiple comparison between the two. What I am looking for is the high availability, or no downtime/live migration, when a host need to be taken down. I know Hyper-V has cluster but is it the same as high availability as VMware?

Our IT consultant recommended 2 servers and 1 SAN + VMware Essential Pro. 2 Servers run us about $2.5k each. 1 San run us about $10-12K for 2.4tb. VmWare Essential Pro license is about $5k. That totaled to $20K! (exclude labor)

I am trying to save some money here and wonder if Hyper-V can be the answer? For our infrastructure we have 2 mission critical servers. 1st is file server. 2nd is for compliance and accounting application. We want to have both server running at all time. Putting both servers as virtual instance onto the same host is not ideal to my boss (who is going to pay for all these stuff).

Ultimately, I am trying to prove that Hyper-V is better in our scenario and we do not need to spend a fortune for it.

Hyper-V clustering seem ideal but can it achieve what VMware high availability does?

---

these are some link that I have gone through before posting this question:

Hyper-V | Failover clustering

Hyper-V Clustering vs Hyper-v Replicate (I did not go through all the linked sites..)

Server 2012 r2 Hyper-V failover clustering - does it require a SAN?

Hyper-V Cluster Local Storage

Hyper-V cluster + external SAN ?

Starwind & Hyper-v Best practice

---

Budget is still a thing so I cannot spend a lot. I'm trying to get a solution that is less than $15K total (exclude any labor).

Storage space: 2TB used.. so 4-6TB in RAID10 (SAS10K or SATA7.2K for Hyper-V HA?) 2 hosts with RAM 32GB on each. CPU single E5-2620-v3.

Any thought?

@scottalanmiller MangoLassi is on my home page. Great community!

We have action packs and are now in a position to acquire more office licenses. My thought was to get Silver which will provide us enough Office license we need plus other product that we can use to test.

Some people make mistakes unknowingly, some foresee everything crumbling down and not take any action until it collapsed. As for OP... I would call him an idiot for letting it happens based on the information I have on him...which is nothing, zero, nada. I don't know what kind of situation he is in and I cannot fully call him out for what had happened. But that doesn't changed the fact that it already happened.

He might be short on budget? He might be running on VMWare without proper approval from management or higher ups? I could think of couple reasons as to why he would not/could not get a license for his infrastructure. If it's REALLY important and he neglect it then idiot seem fitting. Again.. I don't know the story behind it.

I feels calling someone dense without reason is out of line, but it's not out of context.

@MattSpeller said in Is it bashing to ask what other were thinking:

This community can be a little... predatory... on the folks less experienced in IT. Well intentioned, absolutely. But a little vicious to the unwary.

I don't feel like that. I am new to System Admin with little to no experience prior. That was a year ago. I spent 60-70hours a week the first couple months to get me on track and SAM, SW, and Mangolassi-an has been a great help so far. Yes, I made mistakes. Yes, I almost implement IPOD on my infrastructure. But I learned. I grow. All thanks to you guys here (and SW).

@scottalanmiller
Veeam FTW!! Easy.. Free.. Perfect!! Their recovery media only takes up 500Mb for my 1TB computer so get a 1GB USB and you are set for bare metal restore.

@DustinB3403 said in Is it bashing to ask what other were thinking:

@Kelly said in Is it bashing to ask what other were thinking:

@DustinB3403 said in Is it bashing to ask what other were thinking:

Why must a conversation be so political correct (buttercup approached) if it is clearly a jackass conversation.

I don't get involved in those, or I exit them when they take a downward turn. Not worth my time or energy.

And what if you end up working for this place? You nor I know where they are, and hopefully the problems are addressed and fixed rather than getting dumped onto the next person in the commanders chair.

I was dumped with a broken infrastructure where everything is IPOD. At that point it becomes "My Monkey. My Circus. Get OUT! Let me do my thing."

Didn't saw any PM so just PMed KOOLER. Very detail explanation. I don't think I understand the whole thing either.
Thanks MangoLassi and Kooler. Will await for a reply.

@scottalanmiller said:

I'm not very adept at SMS use, but what about using email to SMS gateways so that on your side, it remains email and can be tracked via standard email tools?

That actually is what I am trying to do but a phone number can belong to any carrier. I want to know if there is a way to determine or a service that can provide SMSgateway per phone number.

@Lakshmana
This article pointed out problem with authentication http://www.virtualizationadmin.com/articles-tutorials/microsoft-hyper-v-articles/general/diagnosing-live-migration-failures-part2.html

This article resolved the problem http://www.hyper-v.nu/archives/pnoorderijk/2013/03/microsoft-virtual-system-migration-serviceservice-is-missing/

Also, my Active Directory is a bit of a mess so there are multiple security setup that inherited when it should not. Restore to default and unchecked inherited resolve that.

Thank you for the article!

I am curious how do you name your servers? I saw some named as Server1, Server2 to Mars, Venus, Jupiter, or just plain random like Server1, COD13, I79sdH12...

What do you use as a guideline, if any, to name the servers. If you have something else to name workstation I like to know as well. Cheers!

This is a separate thread to a thread on the same server but different problem. http://mangolassi.it/topic/7368/hyper-v-failover-live-migration-failed-error-21502

Currently, everything seems to be working fine... at least on the hypervisor side. The VM server is meant for file server and it need to perform in its top notch performance during business hours. However, the performance is barely acceptable. When saving a blank file (excel) on to the VM it takes couple of seconds with a progress bar. This action should be instant. What can I do to improve the file server performance?