managing network ports

[dmalamba]

I have a cisco 2611 router which i want to use both of its ethernet ports to be conected to same LAN i.e switch. The moment i configure the ports to be in the same network i.e having similar ip addresses e.g 192.168.100.207 and 192.168.100.208 i am receiving an error that there is an overlap. What do i do to resolve this. What if i connect another router to the same switch would their be a conflict as well. I want to do that inorder that i reduce load on one ethernet port which is my gate way to about 16 remote sites and the internet

[david.bradley]

This error is telling you that your interface address subnets are as it suggests overlapping, check your subnet masks and addresses.

Dave

[sachinraja]

Hello.. you cannot configure 2 IP address from the same LAN on two different ethernet ports of a router. If you need to bundle these ports, you need to use a etherchannel.. by doing etherchannel , you can bundle upto 4 fe ports on a router.

but am not sure if a 2611 router will support etherchannel. it is supported on high end routers like 7200, 7500 etc.

[vvbakalov]

You need to configure a BVI - Bridged virtual interface. Search CCO on BVI and IRB (intrgrated routing and bridging) and see which one best fits your needs.

[vvbakalov]

To answer the second part of your question - yes, you can connect 2 routers to a switch and put the ethernet interfaces in the same subnet. That would, however, be difficult to manage. You either will have to change the default gateways on half the hosts on your subnet so they will forward to the second router, or you will have to turn on proxy arp on both routers and rely on the race condition. Using BVI to put 2 ethernet interfaces in the same group is the better solution.