I will like two domain controllers for domain protection should one ever go down. I'd like to setup two physical Windows Server 2012 machines. Each machine will virtualize a domain controller instance and another test instance. I'm thinking two machines so if one machine goes down the other domain controller will pick up. Right now I plan having both machines log into their own workgroup. Is there any benefit to having them try to log into the virtualized domain controller?
Also, if I ever plan on using Hyper-V clustering as a way to shift all the vms to the other machine is it possible with only two machines. I think an SMB 3.0 file share is needed so would this require a third Windows Server 2012 machine, and to implement hyper-v clustering will I require then 3 windows server 2012 licenses to have a third machine act as a SMB 3.0 file share and witness?
Also, if I ever plan on using Hyper-V clustering as a way to shift all the vms to the other machine is it possible with only two machines. I think an SMB 3.0 file share is needed so would this require a third Windows Server 2012 machine, and to implement hyper-v clustering will I require then 3 windows server 2012 licenses to have a third machine act as a SMB 3.0 file share and witness?