Steelhead Appliance Installation and Configuration Guide
11
Virtual Services Platform
Overview of the Steelhead EX
Fail-to-Block (Disconnect) Mode
With fail-to-block mode enabled in a redundant network path environment, traffic is blocked and rerouted
to an optimized backup path in the event of a failure.
This feature is useful only if the network has a routing or switching infrastructure that can automatically
divert traffic off the link to the optimized backup path. In an active-backup redundant network setup, the
active path is configured to use fail-to-block, and the backup path is configured to use fail-to-bypass, thus
traffic continues to be optimized on the backup path if there is a failure on the active path. In the event of a
failure, the LAN and WAN interfaces power down and from a connected router or switch perspective those
devices do not detect a link.
Steelhead EX supports fail-to-block mode on all cards.
The following events trigger fail-to-block if the feature is enabled:
Kernel crash
Hardware failure
Power loss
Note:
You can use this with connection-forwarding, the
allow-failure
CLI command, and an additional Steelhead
appliance on another path to the WAN to achieve redundancy. For more information, see the
Riverbed Command-Line
Interface Reference Manual
.
You set fail-to-block mode in the Steelhead appliance CLI. For detailed information, see the
Steelhead
Appliance Deployment Guide
.
Virtual Services Platform
The Virtual Services Platform (VSP) is a VMware-based virtualization platform that lets you run multiple
virtual machines on a Steelhead EX appliance. With VSP, you can consolidate multiple basic services in the
branch such as print, DNS, and DHCP.In VSP, you install and run virtual machines directly from a
dedicated partition of the Steelhead EX appliance. VSP supports running up to five virtual machines on a
single Steelhead EX appliance.
VSP is included in the native Steelhead EX appliance functionality and does not require a separate
download or license. VSP uses ESXi 5.0 as the virtualization platform.
For details on configuring and using VSP, see the
Steelhead Appliance Management Console User’s Guide
for
the Steelhead EX.
