[ntp:questions] Dimensioning NTP Server

Danny Mayer mayer at ntp.isc.org
Tue Dec 18 03:56:10 UTC 2007


Aggarwal Vivek-Q4997C wrote:
> Hi
> Iam planning to have NTP Server for something around 50,000 Clients in
> the Network
> 
> Can Anyone guide me in dimensioning the NTP Server. What are the
> guidelines that I should take care for dimensioning the NTP Server
> 

I'd probably set up 3 stratum 1 servers at each site and then use
multicast to distribute the NTP packets to the clients. The exact
configuration can depend a great deal on what the clients need in the
way of accuracy and how the network is laid out. While in general
network topology is not important to NTP you can reduce the error budget
by keeping the network stable.

> Also can I two NTP Servers running in active-stand by or in Load
> balancing scenario in the same network

load-balancing has no meaning to NTP. You send a NTP packet and the
server sends a response. You don't need anything in standby, just
include all of the relevant servers in the DNS and NTP will do the rest.
With the new pool conf option you can have it use all of the addresses
listed in the DNS.

This is not different from DNS which has no use for a load balancer or
standby either.

Danny

> Regards
> Vivek Aggarwal



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