Problem adding disks to a Windows 2003 Cluster

Hi All,

I was wondering if you could help me with a problem that we are having.

We currently have a 2 node Active/Passive Exchange 2003 Cluster on top of
Windows 2003 Ent Sp1. This is install on top of a VMware ESX platform 3.0.2
that uses software initiators to talk to the backend Netapp San on iSCSI.

I have been trying to add new disk resource to our cluster as our data
drives are filling up. Here are the steps that I have done so far.

Created the LUN's & added them to the iSCSI initiators in VMware - this
works OK.
Mapped the Drives as RDN's in VMware & presented to the OS - this is also OK
In the OS formatted the new partitions and added them to each node - this is
OK and can see the disks on each node.
This now is the problem part.

When trying to add the physical resources to the cluster group called
"Exchange Group" through cluster administrator
ie, mapping Drive N on the node as Physical disk resource N in the cluster,
when you get to the end of the wizard no drives appear to be able to select
in the drop down box.

When trying to do this via the command line on the live node I get the
following.

C:\Documents and Settings\administrator.LOOKERSGRP>cd\

C:\>cluster . res "Disk N:" /create /group:"Exchange Group" /type:"physical
disk"

Creating resource 'Disk N:'...

Resource Group Node Status
-------------------- -------------------- --------------- ------
Disk N: Exchange Group PLCEXCH01 Offline

C:\>cluster . res "Disk N:" /priv Drive="N:"


System error 87 has occurred (0x00000057).
The parameter is incorrect.

C:\>

I have found that there is an issue and installed Windows Server 2003 Hotfix
KB937444 to get around this error,.

Even after rebooting both the nodes I still have the same behaviour. The
drives are presented on the passive node as the same drive letters as the
Live node.

Can anyone please shed some light on this?

Thanks
Barrie

When you add a disk in cluster node it adds the signature in clusdisk

Follow the article to understand how cluster behaves When you bring a
physical disk online - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/932465 A new physical
disk resource does not successfully move to another cluster node on a Windows
Server 2003-based server cluster.

Otherwise, you may have to contact the technical support.

Avinash

"Darkhelmet75" wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> I was wondering if you could help me with a problem that we are having.
>
> We currently have a 2 node Active/Passive Exchange 2003 Cluster on top of
> Windows 2003 Ent Sp1. This is install on top of a VMware ESX platform 3.0.2
> that uses software initiators to talk to the backend Netapp San on iSCSI.
>
> I have been trying to add new disk resource to our cluster as our data
> drives are filling up. Here are the steps that I have done so far.
>
> Created the LUN's & added them to the iSCSI initiators in VMware - this
> works OK.
> Mapped the Drives as RDN's in VMware & presented to the OS - this is also OK
> In the OS formatted the new partitions and added them to each node - this is
> OK and can see the disks on each node.
> This now is the problem part.
>
> When trying to add the physical resources to the cluster group called
> "Exchange Group" through cluster administrator
> ie, mapping Drive N on the node as Physical disk resource N in the cluster,
> when you get to the end of the wizard no drives appear to be able to select
> in the drop down box.
>
> When trying to do this via the command line on the live node I get the
> following.
>
> C:\Documents and Settings\administrator.LOOKERSGRP>cd\
>
> C:\>cluster . res "Disk N:" /create /group:"Exchange Group" /type:"physical
> disk"
>
> Creating resource 'Disk N:'...
>
> Resource Group Node Status
> -------------------- -------------------- --------------- ------
> Disk N: Exchange Group PLCEXCH01 Offline
>
> C:\>cluster . res "Disk N:" /priv Drive="N:"
>
>
> System error 87 has occurred (0x00000057).
> The parameter is incorrect.
>
> C:\>
>
> I have found that there is an issue and installed Windows Server 2003 Hotfix
> KB937444 to get around this error,.
>
> Even after rebooting both the nodes I still have the same behaviour. The
> drives are presented on the passive node as the same drive letters as the
> Live node.
>
> Can anyone please shed some light on this?
>
> Thanks
> Barrie
>
>
>
>

Hello,

I worked an issue similar to this and the workaround was to manually
hack the registry to fix this. When this error is encountered, you
will need to locate the Physical disk resource GUID in the registry
and manually add the Signature key and hex disk signature value:

1) Under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Cluster\Resources key locate the {GUID}
for the physical disk resource you added.
2) Under the Parameters key, ADD a DWORD value called Signature -
assign it the HEX disk signature number.
3) You should now be able to bring it Online in Cluster Administrator.

Yeah, it's a bit of a hack, but it worked.

Regards,
John

> "Darkhelmet75" wrote:
> > Hi All,
>
> > I was wondering if you could help me with a problem that we are having.
>
> > We currently have a 2 node Active/Passive Exchange 2003Clusteron topof
> > Windows 2003 Ent Sp1. This is install on top of a VMware ESX platform 3..0.2
> > that uses software initiators to talk to the backend Netapp San on iSCSI.
>
> > I have been trying to add new disk resource to ourclusteras our data
> > drives are filling up. Here are the steps that I have done so far.
>
> > Created the LUN's & added them to the iSCSI initiators in VMware - this
> > works OK.
> > Mapped the Drives as RDN's in VMware & presented to the OS - this is also OK
> > In the OS formatted the new partitions and added them to each node - this is
> > OK and can see thediskson each node.
> > This now is the problem part.
>
> > When trying to add the physical resources to theclustergroup called
> > "Exchange Group" throughclusteradministrator
> > ie, mapping Drive N on the node as Physical disk resource N in thecluster,
> > when you get to the end of the wizard no drives appear to be able to select
> > in the drop down box.
>
> > When trying to do this via the command line on the live node I get the
> > following.
>
> > C:\Documents and Settings\administrator.LOOKERSGRP>cd\
>
> > C:\>cluster. res "Disk N:" /create /group:"Exchange Group" /type:"physical
> > disk"
>
> > Creating resource 'Disk N:'...
>
> > Resource Group Node Status
> > -------------------- -------------------- --------------- ------
> > Disk N: Exchange Group PLCEXCH01 Offline
>
> > C:\>cluster. res "Disk N:" /priv Drive="N:"
>
> > System error 87 has occurred (0x00000057).
> > Theparameterisincorrect.
>
> > C:\>
>
> > I have found that there is an issue and installed Windows Server 2003 Hotfix
> > KB937444 to get around this error,.
>
> > Even after rebooting both the nodes I still have the same behaviour. The
> > drives are presented on the passive node as the same drive letters as the
> > Live node.
>
> > Can anyone please shed some light on this?
>
> > Thanks
> > Barrie