From owner-freebsd-isp Sat Aug 16 05:49:20 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id FAA21843 for isp-outgoing; Sat, 16 Aug 1997 05:49:20 -0700 (PDT) Received: from junior.portal.net.au (junior.portal.net.au [202.12.71.1]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id FAA21835 for ; Sat, 16 Aug 1997 05:49:16 -0700 (PDT) Received: (from matt@localhost) by junior.portal.net.au (8.8.5/8.8.5) id WAA12886 for freebsd-isp@FreeBSD.ORG; Sat, 16 Aug 1997 22:21:18 +0930 (CST) From: Matt Baker Message-Id: <199708161251.WAA12886@junior.portal.net.au> Subject: Re: Multi-homed - Load Balancing - No Single Point of Failure To: freebsd-isp@FreeBSD.ORG Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 22:21:16 +0930 (CST) In-Reply-To: from "Adrian Chadd" at Aug 15, 97 06:40:06 pm X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL25] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-freebsd-isp@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > > Given two upstream providers is it possible to use a single or two FreeBSD > > boxes to do BGP routing and load balancing? And if so, what equipment > > should we use? T1 Cards? Routers? > I have a 486Dx2-66, 16mb RAM with 3 ISA Ne2000's as our main gateway box. > Currently it handles around 450kbytes/s on each interface at peak times, > I *also* on top of that run gated with iBGP sessions and an OSPF mesh > for internal routing, I think with the full AS1221 route map (about 5000 > routes, describing where Australia is), about 350 routes for the local > peering traffic, and another 50 for the OSPF mesh.. its handling it > quite nicely :) > > Now, if a FreeBSD machine can do *that* with 6000 ip route lines, I > think its doing pretty good. Interesting. I'm currently looking at starting to use BGP, and this thread is proving to be a mindfield of information! (Thanks!) I have a couple of questions, mainly due to my lack of understanding about BGP that I was wondering if someone could help with? Currently our main connection to the internet is handled by a Cisco 2501, but we have recently connected a second link via another provider. At the moment this second link is being tested on a FreeBSD box. >From what I've heard, the 2501 won't handle a full BGP load due to the lack of memory. A couple of questions: 1. Is it possible to only exist with a limited set of BGP data in Australia? Is this the iBGP you mention? 2. Would it be possible to let the 2501 handle the serial traffic on the link, with a default route to a FreeBSD box which then looks after the full BGP dataset? The second link could either also hang off the 2501, or the FreeBSD box. I really don't have any problem with using FreeBSD boxes as main routers, but we've got the 2501, so I might as well use it if possible. thanks again, Matthew. ------------- matt baker matt@portal.net.au Adelaide, South Australia.