That's just my IT network. We're a tech company that does a lot of
cross-site collaboration - network downtime hurts here.

The customer facing, hosted services network was a bit MORE redundant.

We are using ISDN dial backup for the offices that don't have Internet
pipes, however. Fairly cost effective, unless your pipes go down a lot.

------------------------------------------------------
Roger D. Seielstad - MCSE
Sr. Systems Administrator
Inovis - Formerly Harbinger and Extricity
Atlanta, GA


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Randall Yoo [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] 
> Sent: Thursday, December 19, 2002 2:38 PM
> To: NT 2000 Discussions
> Subject: RE: Minimum VPN req's
> 
> 
> It appears Roger's network has fully redundant, multiple 
> paths from and to
> each sites - one path via private WAN, another by VPN over the public
> internet (the company must be well-budgeted and management
> IT/technology-friendly  :)).
> 
> Whereas, Robert's network selectively uses (probably based on circuit
> availability) private WAN to interconnect some sites and VPN 
> over the public
> internet to interconnect other sites (actually a very common
> setup/topology).
> 
> Alternate method of providing backup/redundant circuit for 
> those critical
> sites would be to augment your (Robert's) circuit between hub site and
> remote site(s) (frame? or, T1?) with ISDN and use a command 
> like "backup int
> bri0" for automatic failover.  This way, the ISDN kicks in 
> only if the main
> circuit goes down and, therefore, you'd normally pay only the monthly
> service charge.
> 
> 
> Randall
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Robert Gonzaga
> (306)
> Sent: Thursday, December 19, 2002 08:22 AM
> To: NT 2000 Discussions
> Subject: RE: Minimum VPN req's
> 
> 
> Nice.  I really only need to do this with only one of our 
> more critical
> locations.  It's a hub and spoke type a setup with the hub 
> router having the
> PIX as it's default gateway (unfortunately we're not doing 
> vpn there).  I
> haven't done vpn from router-to-router.  Should be 
> interesting.  Thanks for
> the info.  I think it's something to keep in mind when we 
> become a corporate
> giant.  :)
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Roger Seielstad [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Thursday, December 19, 2002 8:09 AM
> To: NT 2000 Discussions
> Subject: RE: Minimum VPN req's
> 
> We're a little different here.. ;)
> 
> We run BGP for our internal WAN infrastructure, and the core 
> routers in each
> office have default routes to their respective firewalls. The 
> firewalls have
> meshed tunnels which are always up, and corresponding static 
> routes for all
> necessary networks.
> 
> In a nutshell, what happens is each core router gets 
> distributed routes from
> its BGP neighbors, and when any of those links die, the 
> learned route drops
> (usually takes a few minutes maximum), and traffic which was 
> destined for
> that network then gets routed via the default route for the 
> core router - in
> other words, the firewall. That firewall has a static route, over the
> existing tunnel, to the other sites.
> 
> From what I've seen in the past, this kind of setup only 
> works when you have
> a dynamic routing protocol in use - something that's link 
> state aware. We
> used to do the same with EIGRP, and OSPF would handle it well as well.
> 
> I guess weighted static routes would work, but man that's a 
> lot of work for
> more than a few sites.
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------
> Roger D. Seielstad - MCSE
> Sr. Systems Administrator
> Inovis - Formerly Harbinger and Extricity
> Atlanta, GA
> 
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Robert Gonzaga (306) [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> > Sent: Thursday, December 19, 2002 10:19 AM
> > To: NT 2000 Discussions
> > Subject: RE: Minimum VPN req's
> >
> >
> >
> > That's interesting.  I'm going to try to setup a backup VPN
> > to our WAN links
> > as well.  The routers have the 3DES feature pack on them as
> > well as access
> > to DSL.  I also want to use floating static routes on the routers to
> > determine which link is down.  How does it work with yours?
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Roger Seielstad [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> > Sent: Thursday, December 19, 2002 4:28 AM
> > To: NT 2000 Discussions
> > Subject: RE: Minimum VPN req's
> >
> > They make plenty of sense, depending on your needs.
> >
> > We have a similar set up - a VPN concentrator and a 
> separate firewall.
> >
> > We have a large number of VPN users (Let's just say we have the 1000
> > concurrent user license on the concentrator here) and that
> > level of user
> > load on a firewall which also handles enterprise traffic
> > would be insane.
> >
> > We also do failover routing via PIX to PIX VPN to back up our
> > WAN links, and
> > there are some different routing requirements to make that
> > work which would
> > break the client connects through the VPN.
> >
> > Not only that, we're already budgeted for a few more firewalls to
> > restructure our production DMZ.
> >
> > Its also more secure to keep the firewall and the VPN connect point
> > separate. Keep in mind that you have to authenticate to the
> > VPN box else no
> > traffic will pass through it.
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------
> > Roger D. Seielstad - MCSE
> > Sr. Systems Administrator
> > Inovis - Formerly Harbinger and Extricity
> > Atlanta, GA
> >
> >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: Aaron Brasslett [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> > > Sent: Wednesday, December 18, 2002 5:12 PM
> > > To: NT 2000 Discussions
> > > Subject: RE: Minimum VPN req's
> > >
> > >
> > > Why would you put your VPN box in parallel with the PIX?  Why
> > > wouldn't you
> > > support the VPN on one of the existing PIXs?  Parallel
> > > firewalls don't make
> > > a lot of sense.
> > >
> > > Aaron
> > >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: Robert Gonzaga (306) [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> > > Sent: Wednesday, December 18, 2002 5:03 PM
> > > To: NT 2000 Discussions
> > > Subject: RE: Minimum VPN req's
> > >
> > >
> > > I setup our VPN box in parallel with our 2 PIXs. You need a
> > > public IP for
> > > the outside and a private IP on the inside.  Pop in you PDC
> > > info, WINS and
> > > pool of address for that clients and that's basically it.
> > > It's fast.  You
> > > can use your existing windows client but I'd recommend the
> > > Cisco software
> > > that comes with the concentrator.  The client is a free
> > > downloadable from
> > > cisco if you have a CCO login.
> > >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: Lum, David [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> > > Sent: Wednesday, December 18, 2002 2:00 PM
> > > To: NT 2000 Discussions
> > > Subject: Minimum VPN req's
> > >
> > > All this talk of VPN...what's the absolute minimum equipment
> > > to VPN if both
> > > sides already have fast internet? Software/hardware. I
> > > currently dial in via
> > > PCAnywhere to one site, but I'd love to utilize my DSL and
> > > their broadband
> > > connection to connect.
> > >
> > > Dave Lum - [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > > Sr. Network Specialist - Textron Financial
> > > 503-675-5510
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
> >
> 
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