I’m getting ready to work at the Microsoft booth at the Storage Network World next week in Dallas, TX and one of the items we’re showing is the improvements in Windows Server 2008 Failover Clustering, this time using the recently released RC0 (Release Candidate 0).

I recorded a short (17-minute) demonstration where you can see how to run the validation tool, watch a cluster being created and check how to set up a simple fault-tolerant file server. Here’s the link:
https://www.livemeeting.com/cc/microsoft/view?id=FailoverClustering&pw=josebda

I used a setup similar to what I described before during my testing with the Windows Server 2008 Beta 3 back in June, with three virtual machines running in a single laptop, a dual-core, 64-bit, 4GB RAM HP nc8430 running Windows Vista x64 and Virtual PC 2007.  You can check all the details of the configuration at:
http://blogs.technet.com/josebda/archive/2007/06/04/windows-server-2008-failover-clustering.aspx

You might also to review my post on the new Cluster Validation, which is a tool included in Windows Server 2008 that greatly simplifies the process of setting up a new cluster.
http://blogs.technet.com/josebda/archive/2007/07/29/validate-in-windows-server-2008-failover-clustering-is-your-friend.aspx

Last but not least, be sure to download Windows Server 2008 RC0 and try all this for yourself. You can get it at:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=0818D425-CD47-4279-BE8D-24ABA14530A3&displaylang=en