Misc. Network Server Question

Savatage

I have a server it has 3 NICs only one is in use now -> connected to the network switch. Is there any gain from connecting the two unused Nics to the same switch so all 3 nics are are patched into the switch.

Or are they there to patch into 3 different switches if I had 3

Thanks.

kine

It depends on the rest of infrastructure, if you are able to manage the routing correctly. Each NIC will have own IP address and it means that it depends on which IP or Name you will use when connecting to this PC. Based on this the correct NIC will be selected. But I think that you will not have any performance gain. Only if you use something like "load balancing" in some form...

nunomaia

Probably the easiest way is to use round robin in DNS. When a workstation connects to server DNS to solve Navision Server Name, it will give a different IP address. Each IP address matches an Ethernet card.

Savatage

Thanks for the reply's.

I guess the extra Nic is only good (for us) to plug in a cable modem and use internet connection sharing.
1 nic to connect to the internet & the other for the network.

I guess if increasing performace with multiple nics was possible then everyone would just fill in all their empty slots with more cards

nunomaia

With correct hardware you can use several network cards to increase performance, but it depends in hardware ($$$ ) you can afford

themave

check the drivers for the nics, the built in broadcom gigabit nics in our dell servers can be setup to load balance or if a nic malfunctions the other can take over with out loss of connection for the users.

I use a third nic in the navision server with it own unique IP so I can access the server without affecting the network load on the other nics which are used by the general users.

there are a lot of activities that take up a lot of network bandwith that can benifit from this, such running some reports and using hotcopy to take a snap shot of the database.

Savatage

thats sounds like a plan i like

Have my own personal link 8)