Windows 2016 fileserver cluster on Microsoft StorSimple – Part 4

5th of December, 2018 / / No Comments

Failover to cloud appliance in case of DR event

In a disaster recovery (DR) scenario, the primary device stops functioning. StorSimple uses the primary device as source and moves the associated cloud data to another target device. This process is referred to as the failover. The following graphic illustrates the process of failover.

The target device for a failover could be a physical device or even a cloud appliance. The target device may be located in the same or a different geographical location than the source device.… [Keep reading] “Windows 2016 fileserver cluster on Microsoft StorSimple – Part 4”

Windows 2016 fileserver cluster on Microsoft StorSimple – Part 3

5th of December, 2018 / / No Comments

Setting up a 2*node windows 2016 on-prem fileserver cluster and 1*Windows 2016 fileserver on Azure

In previous posts (part1 and part2) of this series I discussed about the overall solution and how to configure on-prem and cloud StorSimple storage systems. I also explained the steps to provision the storage to servers from StorSimple storage.

The focus of this post is to discuss about the requirements and steps to create an on-prem Scale-Out-Fileserver cluster and a standalone fileserver on Azure for DR capability.… [Keep reading] “Windows 2016 fileserver cluster on Microsoft StorSimple – Part 3”

Windows 2016 fileserver cluster on Microsoft StorSimple – Part 2

3rd of December, 2018 / / No Comments

Setting up the on-prem StorSimple 8600 device and StorSimple 8020 cloud appliance

In the part1 of this series, I discussed about the solution, an overview of different products involved and how those products hang together to provide a fileserver solution with DR capability in Azure.

Now, lets discuss the step-by-step implementation procedure to get the solution into a working state. In this part I am going to show you the steps to configure on-prem StorSimple storage and StorSimple cloud appliance.… [Keep reading] “Windows 2016 fileserver cluster on Microsoft StorSimple – Part 2”

Windows 2016 fileserver cluster on Microsoft StorSimple – Part1

29th of November, 2018 / / No Comments

Introduction to Series

After recently setting up a storage and DR solution for one of my customers to host their fileserver workload, I thought I’d write a series to document its use and to share any useful tips I found along the way. This first post will explain the technologies that were involved in the solution and how the different components hang together.

What will be covered in the series?

Part 1: Introduction to solution, Microsoft StorSimple device and Windows 2016 file server cluster.… [Keep reading] “Windows 2016 fileserver cluster on Microsoft StorSimple – Part1”

Updated Intune and NDES reference architecture, multiple NDES patterns

22nd of January, 2018 / / 7 Comments

Now that Microsoft Intune is accessed via the Microsoft Azure portal, there has been a steady stream of weekly updates to the platform, improving things (for the most part) along the way. As of the end of November 2017, there was announced an interesting new feature that should become part of most Intune environments.
The key feature of note is the new ability to have multiple Network Device Enrolment Servers (NDES) configured for use with Intune.… [Keep reading] “Updated Intune and NDES reference architecture, multiple NDES patterns”

How to create custom images for use in Microsoft Azure

10th of September, 2014 / / No Comments

In this post I will discuss how we can create custom virtual machine images and deploy them to the Microsoft Azure platform. To complete this process you will need an Azure Subscription, the Azure PowerShell module installed and a pre-prepared VHD which you would like to use (VHDX is not supported at present.)

You can sign up for a free trial of Microsoft Azure here if you don’t currently hold a subscription.

Completing this process will allow you take advantage of platforms which aren’t offered “out of the box” on Microsoft Azure eg, Server 2003 and Server 2008 for testing and development.… [Keep reading] “How to create custom images for use in Microsoft Azure”