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Using a Mikrotik router's SMB service as a file share witness gives error

kw flag

I am having an issue trying to use use a Mikrotik CCR router as a file share witness in a WS2019 cluster. I can connect to the share with RW access on a standard Windows 10 machine as well as on one of the member servers in the cluster so I know it is working. When I use the Set-ClusterQuorum -FileShareWitness \\ro.ut.er.ip\Witness -Credential (Get-Credential) command in powershell, enter the credentials when prompted I get a The Parameter is Incorrect error. If I use incorrect credentials it will give the appropriate error so I know it is authenticating correctly. The SMB log in the router does not show any errors, in fact it shows a successful connection.

I am baffled.

Has anybody came across this issue before, or may have some additional troubleshooting steps?

Additional notes: The router does not reside on the same subnet as the cluster members do, but I would assume this would be a non-issue. I am also specifying the IP address of the router instead of using a name in the \\ string.

Nikita Kipriyanov avatar
za flag
I think the problem is authentication. Cluster expects Kerberos authentication on a share, which Mikrotik doesn't support. So I feel it even might be impossible to use Mikrotik to be a wittness share. I didn't checked that, though.
dustovich avatar
kw flag
In Server 2019, it is possible to use any SMB share not just a domain joined share. [Technet Article](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/failover-clustering/file-share-witness) This is new to 2019 only.
Stuka avatar
gb flag
You can try to perform additional test with other share. As an example, you can deploy a Linux samba and try to configure it as a File share witness. Just to test if it is a network issue. As an alternative, you can use some kind of shared storage to configure as a disk witness. As an example: https://www.starwindsoftware.com/resource-library/starwind-virtual-san-for-hyper-v-2-node-hyperconverged-scenario-with-windows-server-2016/
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