Forum Discussion
Need help to understand what Always On is creating with domain\Server$
Hi I hope this is the right group to post this, if not, let me know please.
When installing AlwaysOn and setting permissions, it makes you grant permissions to a domain\Server$ account in the domain (which gets created, but seemingly it can be deleted with no issue). There is no Server$ in AD i can find (hence my previous statement). what is up with the the domain\Server$ creatation?
Hi.
It's the computer account known as the cluster name object used by the underlying Windows failover cluster services and you shouldn't be deleting it.
It's never occurred to me to delete this key object, so I have no idea what specifically can go wrong, but if you see errors logged in the event log(s) (notably the System log) by Windows failover clustering, it's likely going to come back to your deletion of the computer account.
It'd be interesting to see if you trigger an AlwaysOn failover if it actually works in the absence of the cluster's computer account. I would expect it to fail, which in turn defeats the point of having an AlwaysOn cluster.
Edited:
To add another article outlining some of the impacts of removing the cluster name object:
Cheers,
Lain
