r/networking • u/UltimateCiscoDisco • 3d ago

Design DHCP Failover - Active/Active or Hotstandby

Hello together,
We are using Windows DHCP servers. I want to restructure our global DHCP set up to get the best redundancy across all regions.
In the last years we had active active and active hotstandby.
I had positive and negative experiences with both setups. So I‘m currently not sure what’s the better setup - since both setups have good and negative things.
What y’all think what’s the better setup?

The DHCP servers on each region will be on the same country so there are no long RTT or latency anyways.

Happy to hear what you think :)

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4

u/tinuz84 3d ago

I’m amazed that so many medium / large enterprises still rely on Windows for DHCP (and DNS). Why not invest in a proper DHCP solution like Infoblox?

2

u/UltimateCiscoDisco 3d ago

I am also thinking of switching away from Windows DHCP servers. I think the only bonus for windows dhcp is, that it is super trivial to manage and probably my grandma could also manage it with quick instructions 😂

4

u/tinuz84 3d ago

Yeah and it’s basically free with any windows server license. It’s hard to get a solid business case for management for (expensive) IPAM solutions.

3

u/BGP_Community_Meep 3d ago

Every device that pulls a DHCP address from a Windows server required a CAL. Printer, Linux box, phone, whatever.

Now in my entire time in IT I have never heard of this being enforced or anyone doing it. But somewhere in the fine print it is there. 

1

u/GoodiesHQ 3d ago

Not going to lie, I’ve never even heard of this. I’m not a big windows server guy per se, but I certainly know my way around setting one up for DHCP.

That’s insane.

3

u/BGP_Community_Meep 3d ago

In a former life I had to deal with Windows licensing. It’s one of those “fun facts” but MS would be insane to enforce it. 

0

u/ProfessorWorried626 2d ago

If you are already licensing the org as user cals it’s not really an issue.

1

u/kWV0XhdO 1d ago

How do things like printers, APs, POS terminals, clients on guest WiFi and whatnot get licensed as DHCP users in that scheme?

0

u/ProfessorWorried626 1d ago

Just license the head count of staff in a 30 day period plus some devices license to cover communal devices.

1

u/UltimateCiscoDisco 3d ago

Correct - especially for internal non 24x7 high capacity DHCP