HOW TO DISCOVER RIVERBED STEELHEAD CONNECTED IN CISCO NETWORK

Sometimes Network Administrators working on unmonitored site or assessing network infrastructure of some remote sites face challenge of discovering the network and creating network diagram based on available device features like CDP, ARP, CAMtable etc. Especially in Cisco device environment with CDP configured on devices, Riverbed boxes tend to be ignored from low level design diagram since CDP is not supported. It becomes more troublesome when Riverbed box is configured in Layer 2 mode (Inline/Transparent mode). Using CDP, ARP and MAC for device discovery may be a damp squib.

Below is one such scenario where Network administrator gets login to only R1 Router of Site A and is required to provide the Router LAN and WAN Side connectivity detail –

Netflow feature on Cisco Router will be used in this case. Also a basic understanding on ports being used for Riverbed steelhead will make us hit bullseye.isco

Prerequisite –

1. Netflow enabled on Router Interfaces (in this case R1)
2. Information on port used by 2 Riverbed devices = In-path port for appliance to appliance connections (In this case port 7800 in decimal and 1E78 in hexadecimal format)

But 1^st let’s configure NetFlow on one or both interfaces of R1 as below –

Next, we verify to check Riverbed to Riverbed communication is happening on port 7800 (hex port 1E78) using “sh ip cach flow | include 1E78” –

As seen in the output of “show ip cache flow”, we now know that Riverbed is connected on port Gi0/0 on LAN side with IP 192.168.10.3 and remote Site Riverbed IP being 192.168.100.3.

Further reference on Riverbed ports may be available on following link –

https://support.riverbed.com/bin/support/static/oksf8h0os0pck6pv42smvag77t/html/cpgnmrv4gncrfusdps4s1lk261/scc_9.2_ug_h

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Rashmi Bhardwaj

I am here to share my knowledge and experience in the field of networking with the goal being – “The more you share, the more you learn.”

I am a biotechnologist by qualification and a Network Enthusiast by interest. I developed interest in networking being in the company of a passionate Network Professional, my husband.

I am a strong believer of the fact that “learning is a constant process of discovering yourself.”
– Rashmi Bhardwaj (Author/Editor)