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How to Configure Availability Sets in VMM for Virtual Machines on a Host Cluster

 

Updated: May 13, 2016

Applies To: System Center 2012 SP1 - Virtual Machine Manager, System Center 2012 R2 Virtual Machine Manager

Starting with System Center 2012 Service Pack 1 (SP1), if you deploy virtual machines on a host cluster, you can use Virtual Machine Manager (VMM) to configure availability sets for the virtual machines. When you place virtual machines in an availability set, VMM will attempt to keep those virtual machines on separate hosts and avoid placing them together on the same host whenever possible. This helps to improve continuity of service.

You can also configure availability sets in a service template, to specify how virtual machines that are created with that template should be placed on hosts. For more information, see How to Configure the Properties of a Service Template.

For virtual machines that have been deployed on a host cluster, another way to configure this setting is to use Windows PowerShell commands for failover clustering. In this context, the setting appears in the Get-ClusterGroup listing and is called AntiAffinityClassNames.

For information about other settings related to availability of virtual machines on a host cluster, see Configuring Availability Options for Virtual Machines Overview.

Account requirements To complete this procedure you must be a member of the Administrator or Delegated Administrator user role, or a self-service user who has the Deploy action in the scope of your user role.

To configure availability sets for a virtual machine on a host cluster

  1. Open the properties sheet of the virtual machine by using one of the following actions:

    1. To configure a deployed virtual machine, in the VMs and Services workspace, navigate to the host on which the virtual machine is deployed. In the results pane, right-click the virtual machine, and then click Properties.

    2. To configure a stored virtual machine, in the Library workspace, navigate to the library server on which the virtual machine is stored. In the results pane, right-click the virtual machine, and then click Properties.

  2. On the Hardware Configuration tab, scroll down to Advanced and under it, click Availability.

  3. Confirm that Make this virtual machine highly available has the intended setting. (On a deployed virtual machine, the setting cannot be changed, because it depends on whether the virtual machine is deployed on a host cluster.)

  4. Under Availability sets, click Manage availability sets.

  5. Click the name of an availability set, and use the controls to add or remove the set. Repeat this action until all of the intended availability sets appear in the Assigned properties list. To create a new availability set, click the Create button, provide a name for the set, and then click OK.

  6. In the Manage Availability Sets dialog box, click OK.

  7. In the properties sheet, click OK.

  8. To verify the setting for a deployed virtual machine, in the listing for the virtual machine, view the name under Availability Set Name.

See Also

Creating and Deploying Virtual Machines Overview
Configuring Availability Options for Virtual Machines Overview