I am seeking advice for the best way to setup a two node file server failover configuration. I have two identical file servers with Xeon Quad Core processors, 16GB memory and 2TB RAID 1 arrays (LSI motherboard based setup)( 2 - 2TB enterprise SATA hot swap hard drives in each server).
I have read about SMB tranparent failover, Cluster shared volume, Server failover cluster, resiliant file system. I think the option that is best is a two node failover cluster with a cluster shared volume. This is just a basic file server - no SQL server, no print server, no Exchange. About 30 users currently. Looking to prevent a single point of failure, meaning if one server goes down, it doesn't affect the users in terms of being able to remain logged in and access their data files. I thought about doing a virtual server, but that doesn't really seem to be the answer to this specific scenario.
The step by step guides for setting up a server cluster all seem to apply to Server 2008, which doesn't have all the new technologies (SMB 3) and requires external storage systems, which I don't have.
Please give me your recommendations for the simplest and best performing way to accomplish a 2 server high availability file server.
Thanks.