Step #1: Create a bond0 configuration file
Red Hat Linux stores network configuration in /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ directory. First, you need to create bond0 config file and add following lines to it:
DEVICE=bond0
IPADDR=192.168.1.20
NETWORK=192.168.1.0
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
USERCTL=no
BOOTPROTO=none
ONBOOT=yes
Step #2: Modify eth0 and eth1 config files:
Open configuration file(/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0) make sure file read as follows for eth0 interface
DEVICE=eth0
USERCTL=no
ONBOOT=yes
MASTER=bond0
SLAVE=yes
BOOTPROTO=none
Open eth1 configuration file (/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth1) make sure file read as follows for eth1 interface
DEVICE=eth1
USERCTL=no
ONBOOT=yes
MASTER=bond0
SLAVE=yes
BOOTPROTO=none
Step # 3: Load bond driver/module
NOTE>>>For FC less then 11
Make sure bonding module is loaded when the channel-bonding interface (bond0) is brought up. You need to modify kernel modules configuration file /etc/modprobe.conf
Append following two lines:
alias bond0 bonding
options bond0 mode=balance-alb miimon=100
Save file and exit to shell prompt
Step # 4: Test configuration
First, load the bonding module:
modprobe bonding
Restart networking service in order to bring up bond0 interface:
service network restart
Verify everything is working:
less /proc/net/bonding/bond0
You should see the following:
Bonding Mode: load balancing (round-robin) MII Status: up MII Polling Interval (ms): 0 Up Delay (ms): 0 Down Delay (ms): 0 Slave Interface: eth0 MII Status: up Link Failure Count: 0 Permanent HW addr: 00:0c:29:c6:be:59 Slave Interface: eth1 MII Status: up Link Failure Count: 0 Permanent HW addr: 00:0c:29:c6:be:63
List all interfaces:
ifconfig
You are looking for bond0, Eth0 and Eth1:
bond0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:0C:29:C6:BE:59 inet addr:192.168.1.20 Bcast:192.168.1.255 Mask:255.255.255.0 inet6 addr: fe80::200:ff:fe00:0/64 Scope:Link UP BROADCAST RUNNING MASTER MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:2804 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:1879 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:0 RX bytes:250825 (244.9 KiB) TX bytes:244683 (238.9 KiB) eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:0C:29:C6:BE:59 inet addr:192.168.1.20 Bcast:192.168.1.255 Mask:255.255.255.0 inet6 addr: fe80::20c:29ff:fec6:be59/64 Scope:Link UP BROADCAST RUNNING SLAVE MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:2809 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:1390 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 RX bytes:251161 (245.2 KiB) TX bytes:180289 (176.0 KiB) Interrupt:11 Base address:0x1400 eth1 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:0C:29:C6:BE:59 inet addr:192.168.1.20 Bcast:192.168.1.255 Mask:255.255.255.0 inet6 addr: fe80::20c:29ff:fec6:be59/64 Scope:Link UP BROADCAST RUNNING SLAVE MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:4 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:502 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 RX bytes:258 (258.0 b) TX bytes:66516 (64.9 KiB) Interrupt:10 Base address:0x1480
Step # 5: Some issues I had
The first issue was that I had no outgoing internet access once my NICs were bonded. I could get to the server just fine, but it couldnt get out.
I did a route command and got this:
Kernel IP routing table Destination Gateway Genmask Flags Metric Ref Use Ifacelink-local * 255.255.0.0 U 1004 0 0 bond010.95.0.0 * 255.255.0.0 U 0 0 0 bond010.95.0.0 * 255.255.0.0 U 1 0 0 eth010.95.0.0 * 255.255.0.0 U 1 0 0 eth1default 10.95.1.1 0.0.0.0 UG 0 0 0 eth1
The problem was that my default gatway was bound to eth1 and not bond0. Open the config files for eth0 and eth1 and remove any GATEWAY settings. Open the bond0 config file and add GATEWAY=192.168.1.1 and save the file.
Restart networking service in order to bring up bond0 interface:
service network restart
The second issue was DNS. Once I moved the gateway I had internet access, but I could not resolve names. Again the issue was that DNS was in eth1 and not in bond0. Open the bond0 config file and add DNS1=192.168.1.1 and save the file
Restart networking service in order to bring up bond0 interface:
service network restart
That’s it. You now have bonded NICs
Credit goes to the every knowledgeable hamelic for his help.