NLB on Win2k Pro possible?

[Nimit Mehta]

I have 2 Win2k Pro machines with ICS enabled. Both are
connected to different ISPs respectively.
One has IP 192.168.0.50 and serves 25 clients ( all win2k)
Other has IP 192.168.0.100 and also servers 28 clients,
(All win2k)
2 main cables coming from ISP go directly into a Cisco
switch. All cables of all machines including the machine
where ICS is enabled go into the same switch.
Both ISPs provide 2 MBPS.
Both ISPs have down-times. I want to use something like
NLB here, to balance all the load amongst these two ISPs.
If one goes down, all load should automatically be
diverted on another ISP.
I know i will have to use some third party softwares to
achieve this. Or can i have NLB protocol on win2k pro?
Any suggestion?
Thanks.

 

[serverguy]

If this is a workgroup, Win2KPro has a limit of ten connections so I don't
understand your topology at all. With the number of clients you are
connecting, you should be using at least one server as a domain controller,
router(s), etc... You are wasting bandwidth using ICS with so many clients.
It is intended for small home networks.

NLB is not the best solution in this scenario, either.

 

[Nimit Mehta]

No, its just a workgroup. How come 25 clients are served
If win 2k pro allows only 10?
I can install Win2k Advanced server. Then is NLB a
solution in this situation?
Right now whenever one ISP goes down, i have to remove
cables and change IP in my machine with ICS enabled. And
this happens almost 14 times a day in rainy season. Plus
when both ISPs are up, dividing 2 MBPS amongst 25-25 nodes
is not a good idea, beacause, sometimes all 25 on first
server are occupied leaving other 2 MBPS totally idle. I
wanted to add 2 MBPS+2MBPS to all 25+25 = 50 machines.
Packets from a node should be distributed evenly on both
the ISPs. ICS is not giving me fairly good enough
performance here you see? There is no web caching. These
are machines of cyber cafe. People access same websites
500 times a day and all traffic goes to ISP which should
rather come from a local cache server. I wish i could have
powerful web cache server for all these machines to save
bandwidth which is very costly in India right now. We
get b/w as per consumption here. 1000 Rs for 1 GB (upload
+ download = 1 GB.)
I can install win2k advanced server at the most. Do you
think i can improve my networks performance using win2k
advn. server? Or what else is possible here in this
situation?
Its not like " PLEASE HELP!!!!!!!! I am DESPERATE "
situation. But if you guys have some good ideas, i will be
checking this thread 200 times a day to read them.
Thanks.

 

[Steven Umbach]

The 10 user limit is for access to network shares which is not what you are
talking about. To cache web pages you need a proxy server that will do that ISA
from Microsoft will, but it is not cheap. If you know a little Linux then Squid
may be worth a look. The link below has more info on caching programs.

http://www.web-caching.com/proxy-caches.html

Nlb will not do what you want. There are some inexpensive devices that can do
most of what you want. The link below is one from Linksys RV082 that is a
NAT/firewall device and costs around $275 US that can accommodate redundant
connections for the wan and do some load balancing. --- Steve

http://www.linksys.com/products/product.asp?grid=34&scid=29&prid=589