Why WINS for Exchange clustering?
After release of Windows 2000 and 2003 most of companies wanted to wipe out WINS from there networks to reduce burden of maintain this service. Everyone one new DNS will be the ultimate solution for name resolution in future.
Now there are companies who runs there systems without WINS since couple of years, that include Microsoft clusters also.
Especially in Exchange clustering some are telling WINS is needed but from my experience it is working well without WINS.
What is the actual answer for this; is WINS mandatory for clusters? I have done some research on this and had found some evidence why WINS is required.
As all of us know it is recommended not to use WINS or DNS in private NIC in a cluster but public NIC we can have either WINS or DNS, or both.
Exchange setup program and server clustering use NetBIOS but it is not necessary to have WINS; DNS should be support dynamic updates. In some cases Exchange 200x servers may work without WINS but not fully tested without WINS in larges sub-netted networks, because in large environments NetBIOS name resolution broadcast may not function well.
Considering all of these facts it’s better to keep WINS if you have Exchange 200x, MS clusters or large network doesn’t support NetBIOS name resolution broadcast.