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Jose_Peter_2424's avatar
Jose_Peter_2424
Icon for Nimbostratus rankNimbostratus
Jan 18, 2016

F5 BIGIP LTM deployment recommendation

I have a requirement to use same BIGIP LTM box for both external and internal users.External users should access through DMZ switch connected interface of BIGIP and internal users through Core switch...
application delivery
BIG-IP
LTM
Amine_Kadimi's avatar
Amine_Kadimi
Icon for MVP rankMVP
Jan 18, 2016

Keep it simple as much as you can, one NIC interface is sufficient unless you have other requirements than you stated.

 

So basically F5 keeps two separate connections for each flow, one is the client side connection and one is the server side connection. For each side, F5 is using its own routing table to reach the other end. So up to here nothing special.

 

What you need to know is what path will the nodes (backend servers) follow when answering F5 requests. The answer depends on your nodes' default gateway value and on the source address translation setting (SNAT) in the VS. Usually if your F5 is not the default GW of the nodes then you need to turn SNAT on in the VS, the nodes will then see the traffic as coming from the F5 self ip and will return it back to this IP. F5 will forward to the right original user depending on its SNAT table.

 

I hope this answers your question