When you create a listener the IP address and port number combination always has to be unique for every listener.
I created two SQL Server 2012 EE instances on one Windows 2012 server. They both have the same IP address and node name (because it is the same server). They are not using the same port numbers. The first instance is using port 1433 and the second instance is using port 1435. That is working fine.
I created an availability group with one listener. The listener has a unique name and is using port 1433. That is also working fine.
I created a second availability group with one listener. The listener has a unique name and is using port 1433. That generates the following error message: “Create failed for Availability Group Listener ‘ag-list02’. (Microsoft.SqlServer.Smo) … The configuration changes to the availability group listener were completed, but the TCP provider of the instance of SQL Server failed to listen on the specified port [ag-list02:1433]. This TCP port is already in use. Reconfigure the availability group listener, specifying an available TCP port. For information about altering an availability group listener, see the “ALTER AVAILABILITY GROUP (Transact-SQL)” topic in SQL Server Books Online. (Microsoft SQL Server, Error: 19486)”
I wanted to create the following listeners:
Name IP address TCP Port Description
SQLServ1 10.1.1.10 1433 Listener of Instance 1
SQLServ1 10.1.1.10 1435 Listener of Instance 2
Ag-list01 10.1.1.11 1433 Listener of Availability Group 1
Ag-list02 10.1.1.12 1433 Listener of Availability Group 2
Every listener is using a unique IP address and port number combination.
Why is this not working?
Is there something special about availability groups and listeners? Does the general rule that you can use the same port number on different IP addresses not apply for availability groups?
Can I only use a port number once per fail-over cluster?