Ethernet Card Limitations to Number of Connections?

[Bill Moran]

In response to "Michael K. Smith - Adhost" <mksmith at adhost.com>:

> Hello All:
> 
> Are there any physical limitations to the number of connections
> (TCP/UDP) that are determined by the physical interface itself?  We have
> a PF load-balancing solution in place in front of a large number of mail
> servers and we're considering using the same boxes to front our Name
> Server/Name Resolvers.  I'm concerned that the single uplink port on the
> PF box will be overloaded with the number of connections.

A single ethernet card is going to be limited by available bandwidth, and
knows nothing about connections.  As long as you've got enough bandwidth
on the card to handle the traffic, the physical card will be fine.

A single IP address is limited to ~65,000 connections due to the nature of
IP networks.  You can put multiple IPs on a single NIC and increase that
if you need to, but configuring it can be a challenge.

Hope that answers your question.

-- 
Bill Moran
http://www.potentialtech.com