I have a relatively new server that I need to add an interface to. Sitting right next to me I happen to have an old 3Com 905b TX. This card came out of an old Windows 98 machine. It hails from back in the days before CPUs were fast enough to support software nics, and so it's a real hardware-based card. Aside from it's age it's in otherwise good shape.
The cheapskate in me really wants to use this card in the new server, and so I need someone to talk me out of it ;) Why shouldn't I use this card in the server?
This is for our utm/gateway server, which runs a custom linux distro. I know there are linux drivers available for the card. The new interface is to add an additional WAN connection (just dsl, we have dedicated fiber for the main WAN interface) to gain increased internet bandwidth for our users + a little redundancy. This means that:
- If it goes down by itself, it's not taking our full connection down with it as long the server continues to run.
- Though there will be a 100Mbit connection to the dsl modem, we'll never have more than 12Mbit on the line.