We have a single server running Windows Server 2008 with Hyper-V installed running 5 virtual machines. I have purchased a second DELL R805 Server so that we can create a fail-over cluster to our current R805 that is currently in production. Right now, our R805 connects via iSCSI to a MD3000i iSCSI SAN. Before we try to roll out the second server and clustering to our production environment, I want to be able to test and "play with" the clustering features in our lab before rolling it out. The problem is that I don't want to spend a couple thousand dollars on another iSCSI SAN server just for testing. I already have two servers in my lab that are installed with Windows Server 2008 R2 64bit (one is the R805 and another spare desktop that was laying around) and with the Hyper-V roll enabled that should be ready to test with, but I don't have an iSCSI target to use as the Cluster Shared Volume. Is there anyway to install, either on a Hyper-V image or on a external spare computer that we have some sort of emulated iSCSI target? In our lab, we obviously don't need a real SAN, just something that we can test out how to setup the clustering properly outside of our production environment. Any advise is appreciated.
FYI - I have read Jose Barret's blog on WUDSS at http://blogs.technet.com/josebda/archive/2008/01/07/installing-the-evaluation-version-of-wudss-2003-refresh-and-the-microsoft-iscsi-software-target-version-3-1-on-a-vm.aspx, but it seems awfully complex. I'm hoping for an easier solution.
