Failover cable extension

[jcazila]

Have anybody tested to extend the length of the failover cable in configuration with two pixes working in failover?. Some clients are willing to put a pix in one room and the secondary (failover) in another room for safety.

thank you in advance,

alexnap

[k.poplitz]

Have you looked at these release notes? They say 6 feet is the maximum length (http://www.cisco.com/univercd/cc/td/doc/product/iaabu/pix/pix_v53/install/intro.htm)

[tcrellin]

The failover is based on standard PC comm port hardware. I have had about 20ft out of a PC comm port at 115K before but I would not like to rely on it.

[jscinocca]

Use a Stateful Failover insted

This is an RJ-45 portion of failover for the PIX

[vlagioia]

I'd like to understand if there are many problems in using a customized failver cable so assembled:

all the pins (except pin 2 and 3, Tx and Rx) wired directly as in the pinouts description of Cisco tech docs: they are 7 wires and it is possible to carry them on a normal 4-pairs UTP cable

pins 2 and 3 (referred to pin 5 = Ground, of course) carried by a baseband modem on a normal two-pairs cable.

The idea is that all the managing failover functions, that are based on detecting DC power levels on the wires of the first group, may work with long cable also (I suppose many hundreds of meters).

The data flow at 115Kbps is supported by baseband modem and it is able to run also to many hundreds of meters.

I think that it is possible only a problem: if a modem fails the situation, as seen by the other PIX, is analogue to a PIX up but not working and a failover may occur with two PIX running (bad situation). I don't Know if the simultaneous use of a stateful (FastEthernet) failover conncetion may avoid this problem.

Is there anyone, maybe in Cisco Tech Dep., who is able to confirm if this configuration may work?

Thank you in advance

Lagioia