Implementation of VPN Router Hardware Platform using Network Processor

With the Internet explosion, the data rate that a networking device needs to support has increased dramatically. A common data rate requirement for routers today is 10 Gigabits per second or higher. Also, the networking device requires the flexibility to perform packet forwarding and other complex functions such as firewall and quality of service. The router with a network processor can be a solution for these requirements. IPsec provides a standard, robust and extensible mechanism in which to provide security to IP and upper-layer protocols. We can protect packets between hosts, between network security gateways (e.g., routers or firewalls), or between hosts and network security gateways using IPsec. This paper presents an implementation of a VPN router hardware platform using IXP2800 which is Intel´s network processor and Nitrox-II which is Cavium Networks´ security processor. We described the hardware architecture of the implemented hardware platform and the software implementation to boot and manage the system. Also, we implemented IPv4 packet forwarding application which runs on the IXP2800. The architecture of the packet forwarding application is included in this paper