Software clustering vs hardware clustering
Evidian SafeKit
Difference between software clustering and hardware clustering?
Overview
This article explores the pros and cons of software clustering vs hardware clustering by looking at features like data replication, shared disks, load balancing, hardware and software prerequisites, skills to configure the cluster...
The following comparative tables explain in detail the difference between hardware clustering and SafeKit, a software clustering product.
What is hardware clustering?
There are two types of hardware clustering solutions: hardware clustering for backend applications like databases and hardware clustering for frontend applications like web services.
Hardware clustering for backend (like with Microsoft failover cluster) is based on 2 servers sharing a disk with an automatic application failover in case of failure.
Hardware clustering for frontend is based on load balancers (like with F5 BIG-IP) in front of a farm of servers (2 servers or more). The load balancers distributes the TCP sessions to the available servers in the farm.
What is software clustering?
As with hardware clustering, there are two types of software clustering solutions: software clustering for backend applications like databases and software clustering for frontend applications like web services.
Software clustering for backend (like with SafeKit) is based on 2 servers replicating in real-time data with an automatic application failover in case of failures.
Software clustering for frontend (like with SafeKit) is based on load balancing in a farm of servers (2 servers or more). The load balancing is made by software and distributes the TCP sessions to the available servers in the farm.
Pros and cons of software clustering vs hardware clustering
SafeKit software clustering
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Hardware clustering
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Hardware load balancers
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Features | ||
(1) Real-time file replication
(2) Failover toolkit (3) Network load balancing (no dedicated proxy) |
(1) Disk replication
(2) Failover toolkit |
(1) Network load balancing |
Hardware | ||
Standard physical servers, virtual servers or Cloud | Dedicated storage (shared or replicated) | Dedicated network load balancing boxes |
Software | ||
Standard editions of Windows, Linux and databases (even OS for PC and free editions of databases) | Enterprise editions of OS and databases | Firmware in load balancers |
Skills | ||
No specific IT skills for deploying SafeKit | High level skills in storage and OS | High level skills in network |
Evidian SafeKit mirror cluster with real-time file replication and failover |
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3 products in 1 More info > |
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Very simple configuration More info > |
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Synchronous replication More info > |
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Fully automated failback More info > |
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Replication of any type of data More info > |
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File replication vs disk replication More info > |
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File replication vs shared disk More info > |
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Remote sites and virtual IP address More info > |
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Quorum and split brain More info > |
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Active/active cluster More info > |
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Uniform high availability solution More info > |
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RTO / RPO More info > |
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Evidian SafeKit farm cluster with load balancing and failover |
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No load balancer or dedicated proxy servers or special multicast Ethernet address |
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All clustering features |
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Remote sites and virtual IP address |
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Uniform high availability solution |
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Software clustering vs hardware clustering
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Shared nothing vs a shared disk cluster |
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Application High Availability vs Full Virtual Machine High Availability
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High availability vs fault tolerance
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Synchronous replication vs asynchronous replication
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Byte-level file replication vs block-level disk replication
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Heartbeat, failover and quorum to avoid 2 master nodes
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Virtual IP address primary/secondary, network load balancing, failover
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SafeKit: an ideal solution for a partner application
This platform agnostic solution is ideal for a partner with a critical application and who wants to provide a high availability option easy to deploy to many customers.
This clustering solution is also recognized as the simplest to implement by our partners.
Network load balancing and failover |
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Windows farm |
Linux farm |
Generic Windows farm > | Generic Linux farm > |
Microsoft IIS > | - |
NGINX > | |
Apache > | |
Amazon AWS farm > | |
Microsoft Azure farm > | |
Google GCP farm > | |
Other cloud > |
Advanced clustering architectures
Several modules can be deployed on the same cluster. Thus, advanced clustering architectures can be implemented:
- the farm+mirror cluster built by deploying a farm module and a mirror module on the same cluster,
- the active/active cluster with replication built by deploying several mirror modules on 2 servers,
- the Hyper-V cluster or KVM cluster with real-time replication and failover of full virtual machines between 2 active hypervisors,
- the N-1 cluster built by deploying N mirror modules on N+1 servers.
Real-time file replication and failover |
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Windows mirror |
Linux mirror |
Generic Windows mirror > | Generic Linux mirror > |
Microsoft SQL Server > | - |
Oracle > | |
MariaDB > | |
MySQL > | |
PostgreSQL > | |
Firebird > | |
Windows Hyper-V > | - |
- | Linux KVM > |
- | Docker > |
- | Kubernetes > |
- | Elasticsearch > |
Milestone XProtect > | - |
Genetec SQL Server > | - |
Hanwha Wisenet > | - |
Nedap AEOS > | - |
Siemens Desigo CC > Siemens SiPass > Siemens SIPORT > Siemens Siveillance > |
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Bosch AMS > Bosch BIS > Bosch BVMS > |
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Amazon AWS mirror > | |
Microsoft Azure mirror > | |
Google GCP mirror > | |
Other cloud > |
Introduction
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- Features
- Architectures
- Distinctive advantages
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- Hardware vs software cluster
- Synchronous vs asynchronous replication
- File vs disk replication
- High availability vs fault tolerance
- Hardware vs software load balancing
- Virtual machine vs application HA
Installation, Console, CLI
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- Package installation
- Nodes setup
- Cluster configuration
- Upgrade
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- Cluster configuration
- Configuration tab
- Control tab
- Monitor tab
- Advanced Configuration tab
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- Silent installation
- Cluster administration
- Module administration
- Command line interface
Advanced configuration
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- userconfig.xml + restart scripts
- Heartbeat (<hearbeat>)
- Virtual IP address (<vip>)
- Real-time file replication (<rfs>)
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- userconfig.xml + restart scripts
- Farm configuration (<farm>)
- Virtual IP address (<vip>)
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- Failover machine (<failover>)
- Process monitoring (<errd>)
- Network and duplicate IP checkers
- Custom checker (<custom>)
- Split brain checker (<splitbrain>)
- TCP, ping, module checkers
Support
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- Analyze snaphots
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- Get permanent license key
- Register on support.evidian.com
- Call desk
Documentation
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Technical documentation
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Presales documentation