Why have a clustered server solution?
A clustered server is a collection of independent servers that together provide a single, highly available platform for hosting applications.
There are three primary benefits to server clustering:
- Availability
- Manageability
- Scalability
Clustered servers are used to ensure that a database can be kept highly available by failing over the application from one server to another in the event of a failure.
Clustering servers can dramatically reduce planned and unplanned downtime. However, even with clustered servers, a server could still experience downtime from the following events:
- Failover time: If a clustered server recovers from a server or application failure, or if it is used to move applications from one server to another, the application(s) will be unavailable for a non-zero period of time (typically under a minute).
- Failures from which clustering cannot recover: There are types of failure that clustered servers cannot protect against, such as loss of a disk not protected by RAID, loss of power when a UPS is not used, or loss of a site when there is no fast-recovery disaster recovery plan. Most of these can be survived with minimal downtime if precautions are taken in advance.
- Server maintenance that requires downtime: Clustered servers can keep applications and data online through many types of server maintenance, but not all.
Clustered servers can be installed on Windows server 2003 or Linux servers. For more information on clustering click on the link.
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