Can we combine multiple installations of Microsoft SQL Server 2005 or 2008 to act as a single database cluster?
+2
A:
You can cluster SQL Server 2005 or 2008 with some caveats.
I think that you've got to install SQL Server as a cluster from the beginning. If you have separate instances of SQL Server already, you can't cluster them ad-hoc. You'd need to reinstall, in that case.
Clustered instances must have shared storage
You must cluster those instances at the same version and SKU. You couldn't mix a 2005 and 2008. Service packs have got to be the same as well.You CAN cluster different versions of SQL Server.
p.campbell
2010-04-23 18:11:23
Each node's installation of a SQL instance has to be the same version, but you can have multiple instances that are different versions installed on the same cluster.
rwmnau
2010-04-23 18:14:28
Yes, must configure and install them as clustered, you can't "upgrade" stand-alone instances to clustred. You can upgrade and/or apply service packs, but it is neither simple nor easy to do so.
Philip Kelley
2010-04-23 18:14:28
A:
You can't "combine" existing database instances into a SQL Cluster, but you can install multiple instances of SQL Server onto a cluster, and they can be different versions (2005/2008 is fine).
If you've currently got two database servers, and you want to "Combine" them into a 2-node cluster, you'll need to reformat one of them, create a cluster with the other one, add the reformatted one, and then install SQL Server in Clustering mode - the installer will detect the cluster and give you a number of special options.
rwmnau
2010-04-23 18:13:09