Compaq ProLiant Clusters HA/F100 Administrator's Manual page 52

2-18 Compaq ProLiant Clusters HA/F100 and HA/F200 Administrator Guide
Example 1
A Compaq dual-port NIC and a single-port NIC are used in this example
(Figure 2-9). The first port of the dual-port NIC is a dedicated interconnect,
and the second port is the backup path for the cluster-to-LAN network. The
single-port NIC is configured as the primary network path for cluster-to-LAN
communication.
The TLAN Teaming and Configuration Utility (for ThunderLAN NICs) and
the Network Teaming and Configuration Utility (for Intel NICs) are used to
configure the second port on the dual-port NIC as the backup port of a
redundant pair. The single port on the other NIC is configured to be the
primary port for cluster-to-LAN communication.
The interconnect retains its fully redundant status when MSCS is configured to
use the other network ports as interconnect backup. Failure of the primary
interconnect path results in intracluster communications occurring over the
single-port NIC, since the single-port NIC was configured in MSCS as the
backup for intracluster communication. If the entire dual-port NIC fails, the
cluster nodes still have a working communication path over the single-port
NIC.
With this configuration, even a failure of the dual-port NIC results in the
transfer of the cluster-to-LAN communication to the single-port NIC. Other
than a failure of the network hub, the failure of any cluster network component
will be resolved by the redundancy of this configuration.
Node 1
Primary Cluster to LAN and
Backup Interconnect Path
Figure 2-9. Use of dual-port NICs to increase redundancy
Primary Interconnect Path
Hub
Clients
Node 2
Backup Cluster to LAN and
Backup Interconnect Path