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Doug,
The debate between hardware loadbalancers and LVS is pretty
standard now. I've had it myself with at least 3 clients
in the last year. In most cases, the clients begin with
the position that they would rather not trust LVS and
would prefer a vendor to provide support for a hardware
solution - especially when you are talking about substantial
revenue generating sites. However, those that have gone
the LVS route are extremely happy and are glad that they
didn't waste their money.
There are some things you can do with LVS based loadbalancers
that wouldn't make sense otherwise, especially with regard to
creating your own applications on the LVS boxes to analyze traffic
patterns, detect fraud and attacks, and create automated responses
and reports. This can be extremely valuable to high traffic
sites.
But, there are also cases where a hardware loadbalancer may make
sense: if you need a mature layer-7 engine, you have substantial
investments in cisco gear and would rather use their content
engine modules, or if there is some capability specific to the
vendor feature set you require.
I haven't kept up with foundry boxes recently, so I can't tell
you what features they have that LVS doesn't.
In general though, I'd go with the LVS solution if you have a choice
simply for the flexibility to implement, support, and modify it as
you require.
Matt
Doug Schasteen wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I was about to purchase a $1800 Dell server to use LVS on when I found a
> place that sells used FoundryNetworks ServerIron XL's for only $400
> more. I know these things normally retail for $8000 brand new. Does
> anyone have any experience with these types of hardware commercial load
> balancers? I'm interested in hearing what people think about this
> solution vs. LVS. Is LVS more configurable / powerful? Are the hardware
> commercial solutions just an expensive way of doing the same thing as
> LVS? Are they better than LVS?
>
> Let me know your thoughts whether you've used one or not. The Dell
> server comes with a great support / warranty, while the ServerIron is
> used and won't have a warranty. That, and it's still $400 more. But will
> the ease of use be worth it? Will its special abilities over LVS (if
> they exist) be worth it?
>
> - Doug
>
>
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--
Matthew Marlowe
matt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
818-730-3223 Tel
818-991-0326 Fax
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