F5 BIG-IP 520 Server Appliance 4.5

Active load balancing puts applications in control

by Alan Zeichick

New Architect
March 2003

F5 Networks’ BIG-IP systems are network load balancers, critical components of busy Web farms that let administrators deploy fleets of servers to accommodate growing transaction volumes. The new version 4.5 of BIG-IP 520 Server Appliance is powerful and flexible, and on that basis alone, would be a worthy addition to any high-throughput transaction system. But what sets BIG-IP apart is a free SDK called Internet Control Architecture, or iControl, that lets applications exploit each load balancer’s onboard intelligence, thereby increasing overall efficiency.

F5 offers a bewildering array of BIG-IP systems; the 520 is a mid-range solution. Good luck trying to figure out its product line without talking to a consultant.

Although load balancers are best known for parallelizing Web servers, the BIG-IP can distribute traffic between most IP devices, including firewalls, caches, DNS providers, or other transaction servers. The load balancer uses VLANs to define secure zones for the balanced servers; digital certificates limit access to those resources by authorized users and administrators.

At a Glance
	BIG-IP 520 Server Appliance 4.5
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Company	F5 Networks
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