The rookie must see: Explain the Exchange 2003 cluster features

In simple terms, Exchange servers can be used to architect email systems for businesses, schools, and even free mail systems like sohu or sina. It has many improvements in clustering, including improvements in support, performance, and security. The following small series introduces some important Exchange 2003 cluster features:

1. Supporting clusters of up to eight nodes When using Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition or Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition, Exchange supports up to Active/passive cluster of eight nodes.

2. Support for volume mount points When using Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition or Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition, Exchange supports the use of volume mount points.

3, improve failover performance Exchange reduces the time it takes for a server to fail over to a new node, improving cluster performance.

4, improve security Exchange cluster servers are now more secure. For example, the permissions model in Exchange 2003 has changed and the Kerberos authentication protocol is enabled by default.

Change the condition to a prerequisite check Exchange performs additional prerequisite checks to help ensure that the cluster server is properly deployed and configured.

Support for clusters of up to eight nodes

Exchange 2003 introduces support for eight-node Exchange clusters, which enhances clustering. An eight-node cluster is supported only when running Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition or Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition. Another requirement for a cluster with three or more nodes is that at least one node must be passive. For complete details on cluster configurations supported by Windows and Exchange editions, see Understanding Windows and Exchange Version Requirements in an Exchange Server 2003 Cluster.

Support for Volume Mount Points

Now, if the cluster nodes are running Window Server 2003 Enterprise Edition or Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition, the shared disk supports volume mount points. A volume mount point is a directory that is fixedly pointed to the specified disk volume. (For example, C:\\Data can be configured to point to a disk volume.) With mount points, there is no need to associate each disk volume with a drive letter, thus exceeding the limit of 26 drive letters.

Improving failover performance

For clusters in Exchange 2003, the time it takes for one node to fail over to another node is reduced, thus improving overall performance. The following sections describe improvements in failover time.

Improving the Correlation Hierarchy of Exchange Services

To reduce the time required for server failover, Exchange 2003 improves the dependency hierarchy of Exchange services. Specifically, in Exchange 2000, the Exchange Protocol service relies on the Microsoft Exchange Information Store service. In Exchange 2003, these services rely on the Microsoft Exchange System Attendant service.

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