SQL Server - SQL Server 2008 Active/Active cluster memory configuration

Asked By Igor Marchenko

18-Nov-09 08:07 PM

Hello!

We will be installing SQL Server 2008 64 bit EE on Windows 2008 EE
(Active/Active cluster). I would like to confirm following settings
considering we will have 32GB of memory on each node:

1. No need to enable AWE.
2. No need to set 'Lock Pages In Memory'.
3. Cap Min and Max Memory usage on each instance (leave memory not only to
OS, but also to the second instance in case of failover). I am not exactly
sure how to cap memory. Would it be possible to make memory Max adjustment
when failover occurs? Otherwise, we might be wasting memory.
4. No need to set /3GB in boot.ini.

Any other configurational setting to consider?

Thank you in advance,
Igor

18-Nov-09 08:22 PM

1.  AWE is completely ignored in 64-bit SQL.
2.  Maybe.  There are some differences, but not enough to matter.
3) SQL Server has min and max server memory settings internally.  You can
set them via Policy, SSMS, or Scripts.  You can do some custom failover
scripts, but that is fairly complex.
4) /3GB is ignored in 64-bit Operating Systems.

--
Geoff N. Hiten
Principal SQL Infrastructure Consultant
Microsoft SQL Server MVP

19-Nov-09 04:06 AM

Geoff
Can  you please clarify why NO (maybe)need to enable set 'Lock Pages In
Memory'.?

Igor

We have a clustered  two nodes config (Active-Active) as   you refer. Each
node has 16gb RAM
We configured MAX memory to 8gb so on case it failed over there is enough
memory to start working till  the 'bad' node wikk be fixed


Geoff , do you think  the above is acceptable config?

19-Nov-09 09:07 AM

I will let Bob Ward answer that.  He does it a lot better than I do.

http://blogs.msdn.com/psssql/archive/2009/09/11/fun-with-locked-pages-awe-task-manager-and-the-working-set.aspx

--
Geoff N. Hiten
Principal SQL Infrastructure Consultant
Microsoft SQL Server MVP

14-Dec-09 09:19 PM

In
r. Each
gh
u can
ver
E
ly

Igor, AWE is a set of API's that SQL uses to access memory. By setting
Lock Pages in Memory your are using AWE. Don't let the other responses
confuse you. I would set the max server memory to 28GB.
/3GB is used in a 32 bit OS to provide a larger VAS.

cheers,
Brent.

any other questions you can email me direct... www.sqldba.co.nz