> I'd be interested to know what, besides a complete lack of networking
> knowledge, makes you believe that a network with several hundred
> routes distributed via RIP is inefficient.
>
> There is no reason for a network with "several hundred RIP routes"
> to be inefficient. I've worked on quite large (50-60 sites world-wide,
and
> Maybe I haven't got the point yet on routing, but why can't you split a
> couple of class C's into 27-bit subnets, allocating one 32-address block
> to each PM for dynamic allocation? Would this not dramatically reduce
> the number of routes required?
> The slick way to do this is to subnet your network into /27 blocks (8
> subnets with netmask 255.255.255.224) and if you use the first subnet
> (A.B.C.0) for the Ethernet, all the PM's will recognize that the network is
> subnetted & behave nicely. There are 30 usable host addresses per subnet
> which meshes rather nicely with 30-port boxes. Set the first PM up with an
> assigned address of A.B.C.33 and the second with A.B.C.65 etcetera, you will
> only get one subnet route per PM and not 30 host routes.
and
> I have 3 pm2ers and one class c, they are all at remote locations. So, I
> at first subnetted them to a 64 block, x.x.x.192 but was having problems
We have been doing this on our network for months, and we have no need
for RIP (and the craziness associated with it) except for our static
ip'ed customers; and in this case, the PM only needs to broadcast, not
listen.