Microsoft clustering may be used with Storage Foundation to provide high availability for your application.

A high availability solution maintains continued functioning of applications in the event of computer failure, where data and applications are available using redundant software and hardware. "High availability" can refer to any software or hardware that provides fault tolerance, but generally it has become associated with clustering.

A cluster is a group of independent computers working together as a single system to ensure that mission-critical applications and resources are highly available. The cluster is managed as a single system, shares a common namespace, and is specifically designed to tolerate component failures and to support the addition or removal of components in a way that is transparent to users.

Keeping data and applications functioning 24 hours a day and seven days a week is a requirement for critical applications today. Clustered systems have several advantages, including fault tolerance, high availability, scalability, simplified management, and support for rolling upgrades.