In this post, I'm providing a reference to the most relevant content related to Windows Server 2012 that is related to the File Server, the SMB 3.0 features and its associated scenarios like Hyper-V over SMB and SQL Server over SMB. It's obviously not a complete reference (there are new blog posts every day), but hopefully this is a useful collection of links for Windows Server 2012 users.
Summaries of SMB 3.0 features in Windows Server 2012:
- Overview of SMB 3.0 in WIndows Server 2012 [Video] [TechEd]
- SNIA Tutorial: SMB Remote File Protocol (including SMB 3.0) (SNW Fall 2012)
- Windows Server 2012: Which version of the SMB protocol (SMB 1.0, SMB 2.0, SMB 2.1 or SMB 3.0) you are using on your File Server?
- Windows Server 2012, File Servers and SMB 3.0 – Simpler and Easier by Design
- Windows Server Blog - Taking Server Application Storage to Windows File Shares
- List of all video recordings related to SMB 3.0 from TechEd North America
Step-by-step instructions:
- Hyper-V over SMB configuration with Windows Server 2012 - Step-by-step Installation using PowerShell (Hyper-V over SMB, clustered)
- Windows Server 2012 Scale-Out File Server for SQL Server 2012 - Step-by-step Installation (SQL Server over SMB, clustered)
- Sample PowerShell Scripts for Storage Spaces, standalone Hyper-V over SMB and SQLIO testing (Hyper-V over SMB, Storage Spaces, not clustered)
Articles on File Storage for Application Servers (Hyper-V over SMB, SQL Server over SMB):
- File Storage Strategies for Private Cloud (including Hyper-V over SMB performance) [Video] [MMS 2013]
- Hyper-V over SMB [Video] [TechEd 2012]
- SQL Server over SMB [Video] [TechEd 2012]
- Hyper-V over SMB: Remote File Storage Support in Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V (SNW Fall 2012 Presentation)
- Overview of Hyper-V over SMB from the SNW Spring 2012 Conference
- ESG Lab Report showing Windows Server 2012 Storage and Networking performance (includes Hyper-V over SMB performance)
- Hyper-V over SMB – Sample Configurations
- Hyper-V over SMB – Performance considerations
- Hardware options for highly available Windows Server 2012 systems using shared, directly-attached storage
Articles on SMB Transparent Failover and SMB Scale-Out:
- SMB Transparent Failover – making file shares continuously available
- File Server for Scale-Out application data
- Deep dive on Transparent Failover and Scale-Out [Video] [TechEd 2012]
- Understand and Troubleshoot Scale-out File Servers in Windows Server "8" Beta
- How does New-SmbShare know whether the new share should be standalone, clustered or scale-out?
- Increasing Availability – The REAP Principles (Redundancy, Entanglement, Awareness and Persistence)
Articles on SMB Direct (SMB over RDMA) and SMB Multichannel:
- SMB Multichannel and NIC Teaming [Video] [TechEd 2012] (SMB Multichannel covered on the second half)
- SMB Direct (SMB over RDMA) and Cluster-in-a-box [Video] [TechEd 2012] (SMB direct covered on the second half)
- The basics of SMB Multichannel, a feature of Windows Server 2012 and SMB 3.0
- High Throughput File Servers with SMB Direct, Using the Three Flavors of RDMA network adapters (SNW Fall 2012 Presentation)
- MMS 2013 Demo: Hyper-V over SMB at high throughput with SMB Direct and SMB Multichannel
- Deploying Windows Server 2012 with SMB Direct (SMB over RDMA) and the Chelsio T4 cards using iWARP – Step by Step
- Deploying Windows Server 2012 with SMB Direct (SMB over RDMA) and the Mellanox ConnectX-3 using 10GbE/40GbE RoCE – Step by Step
- Deploying Windows Server 2012 with SMB Direct (SMB over RDMA) and the Intel NetEffect NE020 card using iWARP – Step by Step
- Deploying Windows Server 2012 with SMB Direct (SMB over RDMA) and the Mellanox ConnectX-2/ConnectX-3 using InfiniBand – Step by Step
Articles on Failover Clustering related to File Server Clusters:
- How to Enable CSV Cache - Used by Scale-out File Servers
- How to Configure an Alias for a Clustered SMB Share with Windows Server 2012
- Draining Nodes for Planned Maintenance with Windows Server 2012
Articles on other SMB 3.0 features and capabilities:
- The basics of SMB PowerShell, a feature of Windows Server 2012 and SMB 3.0
- The built-in SMB PowerShell aliases in Windows Server 2012 and Windows 8
- Windows Server 2012 and SMB 3.0 – VSS for SMB File Shares
- A developer's view on VSS for SMB File Shares
- Episode 20 of "From End to Edge and Beyond" covers SMB Encryption in Windows Server 2012 and SMB 3.0
- Windows PowerShell Reference Sheet for File and Storage Services in Windows Server “8” Beta
- How to use the new SMB 3.0 WMI classes in Windows Server 2012 and Windows 8 (from PowerShell)
- SMB Management API
Windows Server File Server Tips and Questions:
- Switch to the High Performance power profile
- Make sure your network interfaces are RSS-capable
- Use multiple subnets when deploying SMB Multichannel in a cluster
- Disable 8.3 Naming (and strip those short names too)
- Continuous Availability does not work with volumes using 8.3 naming or NTFS compression
- Enable CSV Caching on Scale-Out File Server Clusters
- Avoid loopback configurations for Hyper-V over SMB
- Run the File Services Best Practices Analyzer (BPA)
- Use PowerShell to find the free space on the volume behind an SMB file share
- New per-share SMB client performance counters provide great insight
- Minimum version of Mellanox firmware required for running SMB Direct in Windows Server 2012
- How much traffic needs to pass between the SMB Client and Server before Multichannel actually starts?
- Is it possible to run SMB Direct from within a VM?
- Can I use SMB3 storage without RDMA?
- I only have two NICs on my Hyper-V host. Should I team them or not?
- How to rebalance a Scale-Out File Server using a little PowerShell
Private Cloud Solution Architecture:
- Windows Server 2012 and SMB 3.0 demos at TechEd showcase File Server with multiple storage configurations and technologies
- Common Network Configuration for Hyper-V, including QoS
- Cloud Datacenter Network Architecture in the Windows Server “8” era
- Cloud Datacenter Storage Approaches in the Windows Server 2012 era
- Building Your Cloud Infrastructure: Converged Data Center with File Server Storage
- Let’s Build a Cloud… With PowerShell! - Part 1: Deployment and Configuration
TechNet Radio (includes Video) with Bob Hunt and Jose Barreto:
- Road to TechEd 2012 - File Storage Support in Windows Server 2012 (June 4th 2012)
- Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V over SMB (August 31st 2012)
- Windows Server 2012 - How to Scale-Out a File Server and use it for Hyper-V (September 5th 2012)
- Hyper-V over SMB: Step-by-Step Installation using PowerShell (September 16th 2012)
- SMB Multi-channel Basics for Windows Server 2012 and SMB 3.0 (October 8th 2012)
- SQL Server over SMB 3.0 Overview (October 23rd 2012)
- SMB 3.0 Encryption Overview (November 26th 2012)
- SMB 3.0 Deployment Scenarios (December 6th 2012)
- Hyper-V over SMB 3.0 Performance Considerations (January 14th 2013)
- Hyper-V Local vs. Hyper-V SMB Performance (February 7th 2013)
- Windows Server 2012 File Server Tips and Tricks (March 5th 2013)
- Windows Server 2012 File Server and SMB 3.0 – Simpler By Design (April 11th 2013)
Case Studies
- Hosting Provider Uses Industry-Standard Storage to Slash Storage Costs by 30 Percent
- Microsoft Uses Operating System to Triple Storage Capacity, Reduce Time-to-Market
- IT Services Provider Boosts Network Availability, Resilience with Server Upgrade
Knowledge Base articles (Support KBs) related to Windows Server 2012 SMB 3.0:
- KB 2709568: New SMB 3.0 features in the Windows Server 2012 file server
- KB 2695839: Some SMB share properties are only available in updated tools
- KB 2694998: File Server Cluster names longer than 15 chars are not supported
- KB 2686098: SMB connections fail with error "Invalid Signature"
- KB 2777646: SMB Multichannel skips non-routable IP addresses of a network interface if routable IP addresses are also configured
- KB 2772113: Event 1801 is logged when you add a file share to a continuously available Windows Server 2012 cluster
- KB 2801054: VSS_E_SNAPSHOT_SET_IN_PROGRESS error when you try to back up a virtual machine in Windows Server 2012
- KB 2813630: Virtual machine enters a paused state or a CSV volume goes offline when you try to create a backup of the virtual machine on a Windows Server 2012-based failover cluster
Protocol Documentation:
- [MS-SMB2]: Server Message Block (SMB) Protocol Versions 2 and 3 Specification (Windows 8)
- [MS-SMBD]: SMB2 Remote Direct Memory Access (RDMA) Transport Protocol Specification
- [MS-FSRVP]: File Server Remote VSS Provider Protocol Specification
- [MS-SWN]: Service Witness Protocol Specification
Older posts and videos:
- Windows Server Blog - SMB 2.2 is now SMB 3.0. Great overview of SMB 3.0 scenarios and features
- Storage and Continuous Availability Enhancements in Windows Server 8
- High-Performance, Continuously Available File Share Storage for Server Applications
- SMB 3 Security Enhancements in Windows Server 2012 (Includes SMB Encryption)
- Windows Server 2012 Beta - Test cases for Hyper-V over SMB (includes PowerShell examples)
- Windows Server 2012 Beta - Hyper-V over SMB - Quick Provisioning a VM on an SMB File Share
- Enabling Hyper-V Remote Management - Configuring Constrained Delegation For SMB and Highly Available SMB
- System Center 2012 CTP for Windows Server “8” Beta support - Includes support for Hyper-V over SMB
- Fast and Efficient File Servers for Server Applications. Covers SMB Multichannel and SMB Direct.
- Preliminary performance results with Windows Server 2012 Beta and SMB Direct (SMB over RDMA)
- Overview of SMB Direct, SMB Multichannel and SMB Scale-Out from the SNW Spring 2012 Conference
- Application Compatibility and API Support for SMB 2.2, CSVFS, and ReFS
- Windows 8 SMB 2.2 File Sharing Performance
- Windows Server 8 - Storage Changes [Video] - Thomas Pfenning talks about Storage and Availability in Windows Server 2012
- New Server form factors, Continuous Availability [Video] - John Loveall shows the new Cluster-in-a-box systems.
- Microsoft Management Summit keynote [Video] - Brad Anderson on System Center 2012 and Windows Server 2012
- How Microsoft Secures Sensitive Data Using File Classification Infrastructure [Video] - Nir Ben Zvi talks about FCI
- SNIA’s Storage Developer Conference - SDC 2011 content (slides and videos) now available for download
- Links to //build/ sessions on Storage, Networking and Hyper-V - Links to //Build to both videos and PowerPoint files
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Change tracking:
- 04/24/2012: Original post
- 05/01/2012: Update: Added links to two SNW Spring 2012 presentation
- 05/03/2012: Update: Added links to protocol documentation, blog post on SMB Encryption and private could blog post
- 05/18/2012: Update: Added links to SDC presentations, plus blogs on basics of SMB PowerShell and SMB PowerShell
- 06/13/2012: Update: Added 3 new blog post, one new KB article, one new video link
- 08/02/2012: Update: Additional blog posts and links to TechEd recordings
- 08/26/2012: Update: Two additional blog posts
- 11/27/2012: Update: Added 10 file server tips, SNW Fall 2012 presentations, TechNet Radio links. Moved older posts down.
- 01/03/2013: Update: Added 1 TechNet Radio link, 1 white paper, 1 KB article. Added numbers of KB articles next to links.
- 02/02/2013: Update: Added links to a few new blog posts and white papers
- 03/11/2013: Update: Added links to 2 new TechNet Radio shows, 5 new blog posts, separate group for step-by-steps
- 04/11/2013: Update: Added 1 link to TechNet Radio show, 5 new blog posts, 3 new KB articles
- 05/05/2013: Update: Added 1 MMS link, 1 new TechNet article, 1 new tip, new section on case studies with 3 entries