Binsfeldius Cluster, getting SCVMM 2008R2 SP1 up’n’running

Now that the cluster is running stable, I’m going to install System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008R2 SP1 to provide an easy cluster-aware management console. I’ve included each step of the installation so you can see all the choices that I’ve made.

As there are a lot of screenshots for this subject I’ve made the pictures a bit smaller than usual so I can fit them all on the page a little better, click and scroll for the run through…

Installing System Center Cirtual Machine Manager Server

• The first step is to install the Virtual Machine Manager Server
• As you can see, I’ll install a SQL Server 2005 Express Edition SP3 version in this VM. You could opt for a central database VM however I don’t want the additional dependency.

• The default share for the SCVMM Library will be on the DFSROOT disk (mounted on this VM as W:). This way I have access to the templates/ISO’s and VHD’s from everywhere in the domain.
• I’ll leave the default ports for communication as there is nothing else running on these ports on the system.
• I’ve also chosen to use the Local System account as service account for VMM. Just ease of operation for this test environment.

Installing System Center Virtual Machine Manager Administrator Console

• Next step is to install the Virtual Machine Manager Administrator Console. I’m currently installing this on the same VM however you can install this on any machine and connect to the VMM Server.

• Start SCVMM so we can add the clusternodes.
• Connect to the SCVMM Server and as you can see, no nodes yet.

It’s a bit weird that my first clusternode N1BC is not recognized as a Hyper-V host and the other two nodes are.
As you’ve read in the previous post, all three are exactly the same.

• Make sure you provide the HyperStorage location as the default virtual machine path so VM’s are placed in the correct location.

Failed?!

Hmm, as it turns out this is not uncommon. To remedy this you need to install the local agent on the clusternode itself and then add the clusternode to SCVMM

Manually installing the SCVMM Local Agent on the clusternode

As this is Hyper-V Server 2008R2, you can’t run the standard installer to install the local agent on the clusternode. You can run the specific agent MSI package.

1. This MSI package is found in the SCVMM install media under AMD64MSIAGENT and is called VMMAGENT.MSI.
2. Copy the agent MSI package to the install directory under TTGDFSROOT
3. Connect to each clusternode and run the VMMAGENT.MSI

The installation procedure is straightforward:

• Now the local agent is installed, we can go back to the management VM and start SCVMM to add the clusternode.

The job will run and as you can see it is now completed succesfully

I’ve added the other two clusternodes in the same way. As you can see, all the nodes are now in SCVMM.