| Overview

A firewall system working properly will provide network protection against many threats. What happens when there is a loss of power, or some other problem, to the firewall? Is network protection to be sacrificed in order to preserve network availability, or should the network be protected by cutting links until the problem is fixed? Fortunately, these situations can be avoided by establishing failover protection to keep the system going in the event of a firewall failure.

The first topic to be covered is why failover is important and will be able to discuss the difference between stateful and non-stateful failover. Students will then be introduced to the two methods of PIX Security Appliance failover, which are, serial cable failover and LAN-based failover. Instructions will be given on how to configure each one of these in a network environment.

The second topic covered in this module is PIX Security Appliance maintenance and management. This topic includes conducting system maintenance via remote access, configuring a PIX Security Appliance to support command authorization, and performing image and activation key upgrades on PIX Security Appliances. Password recovery is important to the PIX Security Appliance, and instructions about how to do it are included. Instructions for image upgrade are included as well. This module also will include an introduction to various PIX Security Appliance management tools.

NOTE: It is required that the student study the commands covered in the chapter using the labs and the command reference. Not all required commands are covered in sufficient detail in the text alone. Successful completion of this course requires a thorough knowledge of command syntax and application.