netfilter under heavy load.

netfilter under heavy load.

[Mike Olivere]

Hello, I don't know if this has been brought up before but I am going to be
running netfilter under load on a fractional T-3 (12Mbps). The box will have
3 interfaces eth0 going to the Cisco 7200, eth1 (routable IPs) going to the
webfarm for DMZ zone, and then eth2 will be NATed with a private LAN IP
(192.168.1.x). I will be NATing over 200 clients and I know in the past this
could be a problem with IPCHAINS because it would either run out of memory
or start dropping connections. The webservers get about 7,000 hits a day and
they won't be NATed but will be filtered with a mix of statefule and packet
filtering rules. We have a Cisco PIX 525(which is just a Intel P600/512MB
RAM) in place right now but I would like to move to Netfilter as it will be
running on a dual P1ghz and a gig of memory. Is this possible? can Nefilter
scale to this and beyond? and is there any tweaks I should know about?

Thanks in advance.

Mike

Re: netfilter under heavy load.

[ITM CS Ruslan O. Nesterov]

Hello Mike,
   Well actually it's not a big problem, I got 100 GB a day passing
   through our gateway to our clients, as far i didn't find any
   problems for webservers wich are not NATed, as for clients who are
   in DMZ zone i sometimes get connection error, but it's 1 in 1000
   connections. I run a box with the following configuration:
   Single PIII-866 MHZ
   RAM: 256
   NIC: 2 Intel Gigabit ethernet cards (as far as i remember).
   Befor it I used a Firebox firewall and it really drived me nuts.
   Due to low productivity.
   
Sunday, January 5, 2003, 6:40:15 PM, you wrote:

MO> Hello, I don't know if this has been brought up before but I am going to be
MO> running netfilter under load on a fractional T-3 (12Mbps). The box will have
MO> 3 interfaces eth0 going to the Cisco 7200, eth1 (routable IPs) going to the
MO> webfarm for DMZ zone, and then eth2 will be NATed with a private LAN IP
MO> (192.168.1.x). I will be NATing over 200 clients and I know in the past this
MO> could be a problem with IPCHAINS because it would either run out of memory
MO> or start dropping connections. The webservers get about 7,000 hits a day and
MO> they won't be NATed but will be filtered with a mix of statefule and packet
MO> filtering rules. We have a Cisco PIX 525(which is just a Intel P600/512MB
MO> RAM) in place right now but I would like to move to Netfilter as it will be
MO> running on a dual P1ghz and a gig of memory. Is this possible? can Nefilter
MO> scale to this and beyond? and is there any tweaks I should know about?

MO> Thanks in advance.

MO> Mike



-- 
Best regards,
 ITM                            mailto:ruslan@complexsystem.ru

Re: netfilter under heavy load.

[Chris Straessle]

Hello,

my company has tested several firewalls under high network load. The
importest thing is the L2 cache size from the cpu.

check this pdf, it has the information you need. :-)

http://www.terreactive.com/fcgi/fcgi/home/archive/pdf/pf-speed-test.pdf


bye,
chris

ps: sorry for my bad english... its not my language.


ITM CS Ruslan O. Nesterov wrote:
> Hello Mike,
>    Well actually it's not a big problem, I got 100 GB a day passing
>    through our gateway to our clients, as far i didn't find any
>    problems for webservers wich are not NATed, as for clients who are
>    in DMZ zone i sometimes get connection error, but it's 1 in 1000
>    connections. I run a box with the following configuration:
>    Single PIII-866 MHZ
>    RAM: 256
>    NIC: 2 Intel Gigabit ethernet cards (as far as i remember).
>    Befor it I used a Firebox firewall and it really drived me nuts.
>    Due to low productivity.
>    
> Sunday, January 5, 2003, 6:40:15 PM, you wrote:
> 
> MO> Hello, I don't know if this has been brought up before but I am going to be
> MO> running netfilter under load on a fractional T-3 (12Mbps). The box will have
> MO> 3 interfaces eth0 going to the Cisco 7200, eth1 (routable IPs) going to the
> MO> webfarm for DMZ zone, and then eth2 will be NATed with a private LAN IP
> MO> (192.168.1.x). I will be NATing over 200 clients and I know in the past this
> MO> could be a problem with IPCHAINS because it would either run out of memory
> MO> or start dropping connections. The webservers get about 7,000 hits a day and
> MO> they won't be NATed but will be filtered with a mix of statefule and packet
> MO> filtering rules. We have a Cisco PIX 525(which is just a Intel P600/512MB
> MO> RAM) in place right now but I would like to move to Netfilter as it will be
> MO> running on a dual P1ghz and a gig of memory. Is this possible? can Nefilter
> MO> scale to this and beyond? and is there any tweaks I should know about?
> 
> MO> Thanks in advance.
> 
> MO> Mike
> 
> 
> 

-- 
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Chris Straessle			  http://raptor.homeunix.net/
Alias: sacrelege		  email: sacrelege@swissonline.ch
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