Multiple gateways??? Redundant connection suggestions.

[Brian Densmore]

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Patrick
> Subject:	Multiple gateways??? Redundant connection suggestions.
>
> Hi, I am trying to figure out how to deal with multiple net connections. 
> I do not have my own network, so I have two different networks.
Ok, that's confusing.

>My network is comprised of W2k & Linux
>I am thinking of  just putting them both on the same private network, 
>but will I need a psudo gateway i.e. a linux box with 3 nics: one to 
>each gateway, and a 3rd to the local net? Or put both gateways in under 
>each systems IP/route settings. Or give each system 2 lan addresses and 
>two gateways. Or setup 1/2 the pc's on one gateway, and the other on the 
>2nd gateway.
>
>I know both routers (Caymen, and a Netopia 7200) have a RIP setting, but 
>I am sure that is for the public side not the internal side.
>
>Bacicly this if for my DMZ I have 5 pc's/servers and a pix to my 
>internal net  that will be looking at these two gateways.

Not sure I understand from this what you are wanting to do. But, I'm going to give it a shot 
anyway. This is the way I read it

You have 5 pcs, 2 routers and a pix firewall.
You have one network on 1 router and 1 network on the other router
(stop me anytime I get something wrong) and both networks are isolated.
At least one network is connected to the pix firewall?

You want to connect these two networks and add a third network.

There are so many possible configurations here it's not funny.
One solution would be to add a nic to each of the two gateways
thus creating the third network and connecting the two networks.
This would make two network two hops away from each other and one
network one hop away from the other two. 

Another would be as you suggested is to add a third gateway with three nics
connected to both existing gateways and a new switch that connects your third
network. The advantage to this solution would be the new linux gateway could
be used to restrict traffic between the existing two networks easier. This way
your new network would be one hop away from the existing ones and the existing ones would be 2 hops 
away from each other (unless they are already connected somehow). 

You might also want to create a master DNS server.

HTH,
Brian