Microsoft print server provides a great way to share printers throughout your organisation, but when the print server service falls over, the phone quickly starts to ring. By adding a load balancer and a second print server configured with the same print queues , you’ll quickly have a load balanced and resillient printing infrastructure for your users.

The load balancer is configured at layer 4 using DR (Direct Return) mode, and therefore you’ll also need to solve the ARP problem on the print servers. This is a straight forward process that is covered in the section below.

OUTLINE STEPS:

• Create a Virtual Server (VIP) on the load balancer that listens on the various Netbios, RPC and SMB ports used by the print server

• Associate your print servers to this virtual server, i.e. define them as ‘Real Servers’ (RIPs) for the VIP

• Configure registry settings on your print servers & configure WINS resolution

• Point your clients at the load balancer to access the printer shares

SETUP THE LOAD BALANCER:

(the steps listed are for a v7.x appliance, but are similiar for all software versions)

1) Using the WUI (Edit Configuration > Layer 4 – Virtual Servers) create a layer 4 Virtual Server in DR mode using the following settings:

Label:  PrintServer (change as required)
Virtual Server IP address:  192.168.100.10 (change as required)
Virtual Sever Ports:  135-139,445,1024-65535
Forwarding Method:  Direct Routing
Persistence:  Yes
Protocol:   TCP

2) Using the WUI (Edit Configuration > Layer 4 – Virtual Servers) modify the new Virtual Server and set the checkport to 135

3) Using the WUI (Edit Configuration > Layer 4 – Real Servers) add your print servers as Real Servers for the VIP

SETUP THE PRINT SERVERS:

1) Install the print server role to your Windows servers

2) Install & share all printers on each print server – use the same share names and permissions across all servers

3) On each print server, follow through the steps to solve the ‘ARP problem’  for your particular version of Windows – the steps can be found on pages 18-27 of our v7 Quick Start Guide

IMPORTANT: when configuring the loopback adapter, make sure that for the loopback adapter, ‘Client for Microsoft Networks’ and ‘File & Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks’ are also ticked

4) To ensure that the printers can be addressed by their Netbios name, add the following registry entries to each print server:

Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa
Value: DisableLoopbackCheck
Type: REG_DWORD
Data: 1

Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\lanmanserver\parameters
Value: DisableStrictNameChecking
Type: REG_DWORD
Data: 1

Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\lanmanserver\parameters
Value: OptionalNames
Type: REG_MULTI_SZ
Data: PrintServer (for example)

Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\lanmanserver\parameters
Value: srvcomment
Type: REG_SZ
Data: Server 1 of PrintServer cluster (for example)

5) Make sure that WINS resolution is configured correctly so that the printer name (‘PrintServer’ in the above example) can be resolved to the Virtual Servers IP address

That’s it – you should now be able to see your printers by browsing using both the IP address and the Netbios name of the VIP :

\\192.168.100.10\

\\PrintServer\

To install the load balanced printers on a client, simply use the add printer feature, select  ‘Add a shared printer by name’ then type in either of the above and your shared printers will be displayed and can be installed in the normal way.

You’ll also see any shared folders that have been configured on the server which may also be useful depending on your requirements.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 6th, 2011 at 1:47 pm and is filed under High Availability, LVS, Load Balancing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.