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Multiple NIC's for load balancing

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by craig it mangaer 1 view

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I am looking at setting up several new servers and need a little feedback for a quick way to setup two NIC's in the server to balance the load of traffic. Any help would be appreciated.

5 replies

by mdsnitc

First some advice, don't mutihome any WINS servers or any machine that can become a master browser (server resource kit tells how to disable). Also, before you choose to load balance consider your network layout (upstream). i.e what does 2 100mb load balanced NICs buy you if your network is a 100mb collision domain?

We use Intel Pro/100+'s for our load balancing. We use dual and quad port adapters, but 2 singles work as well. If you want to increase Transmit and Receive rates, you will need an FEC enable switch (Cisco or HP ProCurve). Without the switch the best you can expect in Transmit rates increased
. Let me know if you want more details.

Matt
mdsnitc@sandia.gov

by craig it mangaer

though your information is correct, it doesn't really help. Found out about WINS the hard way, wish I would have looked into that one sooner. Since I have a switch in our Computer room, I am trying to setup one or two servers with multiple pathsout as the internal support for the switch should be able to support more than 100mb as it is Gigabit capable and has fiber running to a second switch.

by tejota

Make sure you check off routing between the two adapters, otherwise, they won't even communicate with each and that would defeat the purpose.

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