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I have a few basic questions about using cisco routers. Hopefully
someone can answer these for me.

If i have a two locations with internet access through a local ISP and
i have an IPSEC tunnel connecting them what would I use a cisco router
for?

I understand that routers segment large networks and reduce network
traffic accross a LAN but what advantages do they provide over a WAN?

If I had multiple location all with High speed internet connections and
IPsec Tunnels what purpose would the cisco routers perform? I assume
that the answer tothis is to route traffic but what protocol would be
best to use?

I know that these might seem like basic questions but it will help me
get a better understanding of what these routers are fully capable of.

In article < .com>,
arell12 <> wrote:
>I have a few basic questions about using cisco routers. Hopefully
>someone can answer these for me.

>If i have a two locations with internet access through a local ISP and
>i have an IPSEC tunnel connecting them what would I use a cisco router
>for?

Where is the IPSec tunnel terminated?

We ran for awhile with a media convertor converting our 1000Base-LX
provided by our ISP into 1000Base-SX to run through our premises
fibre, which was then plugged into our Cisco PIX firewall -- with
no router between the firewall and the demarcation point.

If we had been in a High Availability situation with multiple ISPs,
we would have needed a router.

>I understand that routers segment large networks and reduce network
>traffic accross a LAN but what advantages do they provide over a WAN?

It depends how complex your connections are and where you want to
put your security. If you only have a single external connection and
you have a seperate security gateway, then the router might end up
more or less a media (or protocol) convertor. If you have several
connections, then there are a lot of different tricks you can play
with modern routers in order to try to *reliably* detect link failures
and automatically reconfigure the traffic routing.

Thank you for your reply


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LinkWaves Corp
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Walter Roberson wrote:
> In article < .com>,
> arell12 <> wrote:
> >I have a few basic questions about using cisco routers. Hopefully
> >someone can answer these for me.
>
> >If i have a two locations with internet access through a local ISP and
> >i have an IPSEC tunnel connecting them what would I use a cisco router
> >for?
>
> Where is the IPSec tunnel terminated?
>
> We ran for awhile with a media convertor converting our 1000Base-LX
> provided by our ISP into 1000Base-SX to run through our premises
> fibre, which was then plugged into our Cisco PIX firewall -- with
> no router between the firewall and the demarcation point.
>
> If we had been in a High Availability situation with multiple ISPs,
> we would have needed a router.
>
> >I understand that routers segment large networks and reduce network
> >traffic accross a LAN but what advantages do they provide over a WAN?
>
> It depends how complex your connections are and where you want to
> put your security. If you only have a single external connection and
> you have a seperate security gateway, then the router might end up
> more or less a media (or protocol) convertor. If you have several
> connections, then there are a lot of different tricks you can play
> with modern routers in order to try to *reliably* detect link failures
> and automatically reconfigure the traffic routing.