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FortiGate-5140 and 5050 base backplane communication Base backplane HA configurations
FortiSwitch-5003A and 5003 Fabric and Base Backplane Communications Guide
01-30000-85717-20081205 73
To configure HA interface failover to use two FortiSwitch boards
1 Insert the FortiSwitch boards into chassis hub/switch slot 1 and hub/switch slot 2.
If you want to form an HA cluster between FortiGate boards in separate chassis,
link the base backplanes of each chassis by connecting FortiSwitch boards front
panel base or ZRE interfaces with an Ethernet cable.
For example hardware installations, see Figure 23 on page 69, Figure 24 on
page 70, Figure 25 on page 70, and Figure 26 on page 71.
2 Insert FortiGate boards into the required chassis slots.
3 On each FortiGate board to be included in the HA cluster, go to System > Config
> HA.
4 Select the HA Mode, then enter the Group Name, and Password.
5 Set other HA options as required.
6 Configure the base backplane interfaces as heartbeat interfaces.
7 Set the priority of the base backplane interfaces to be higher than the priority of all
other interfaces so that they are selected as the primary and first failover
heartbeat interfaces.
• If interface priorities are not all equal, set the base backplane interface priority
to a higher value than all other interfaces.
• If interface priorities are all equal, set the base backplane interface priority to a
higher value than all other interfaces, or disable interfaces listed above the
base backplane interfaces in the heartbeat Interface list. For some FortiGate
models, FortiSwitch slot positions, or configurations of other HA interfaces, this
may mean that no change is required.
8 If you want to select a different base backplane interface as the primary heartbeat
interface, increase its priority.
9 Select OK.
One FortiSwitch board per chassis
Installing a single FortiSwitch board provides a single base backplane HA
heartbeat and synchronization channel.
Unlike hardware configurations involving two FortiSwitch boards per chassis,
when installing only one FortiSwitch board per chassis, the slot position of the
FortiSwitch board becomes an important consideration. A single FortiSwitch
board should usually be installed in hub/switch slot 1 for FortiGate-5001A or
FortiGate5005FA2 clusters and hub/switch slot 2 for FortiGate-5001SX and
FortiGate-5001FA2 clusters. For details on the effects of slot positioning of a
single FortiSwitch board in HA configurations, see “Slot position and HA heartbeat
interface precedence” on page 77
.
Note: Heartbeat interface precedence can be determined by multiple factors, including
Priority and position in the Heartbeat Interface list. For details, see “Slot position and HA
heartbeat interface precedence” on page 77.
Note: More than one cluster can use the same base backplane channel for HA
communication. To separate HA communications of multiple clusters using the same
channel, configure a different HA Group Name and Password for each cluster.