Changing the IP address of network adapters in cluster server

This article describes how to change the IP addresses of the network adapters in the nodes of a cluster.

During this procedure, it is important that the cluster server maintain a connection to the network. This is necessary so that it can communicate with a domain controller to validate the cluster server Service account.

This article assumes that there are two nodes named A and B.

Note: The following steps do not work for a Clustered SQL install if you change the IP address from one subnet to another subnet. If you change from one subnet to another, the virtual SQL server does not come online. The steps that are described in the following Microsoft Knowledge Base article to resolve the issue where the virtual SQL server IP address does not work:To resolve this issue if you change the IP address from one subnet to another subnet, edit the registry or reinstall the virtual SQL server.

1. Change the IP address of the network adapter on node A. This may require the computer to be rebooted. If you are prompted to restart the computer, do so.
2. Start Cluster Administrator and open a connection to the cluster. To administer the cluster, you need to open a connection to "." (without quotation marks) in Cluster Administrator when you are prompted to do so. You must perform this process on one of the nodes in the cluster. If you do this remotely, it may be possible to open a connection to the name of the node itself. During this process, Cluster Administrator may respond with the following error message:
   A connection to the cluster at cluster name could not be opened. This may be caused by the Cluster Service on node cluster name not being started. Would you like Cluster Administrator to attempt to start the Cluster Service on node cluster name?
   This occurs because Cluster Administrator attempts to connect to the last cluster it administered.
3. Double-click the IP Address resource to open its properties.
4. On the Parameters tab in the IP Address resource properties, make sure that the Network to Use box contains the new network as the network to use.
5. Fail all groups over to the functional node A.
6. Change the IP addresses for the network adapters in node B.
7. Reboot the computer.
8. When both nodes agree on the subnets, the old networks disappear and the new networks are created.
9. You can rename the networks at this time.

You use "." to administer the cluster because the IP Address resource does not come online when the Cluster service recognizes a new network and no longer uses the old network. For additional information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: