Enabling PPTP on Remote Access Switches

This section is intended for ISPs or network administrators who wish to configure PPTP on their remote access switches. ISPs may want to do this as a value-added service for their clients. Network administrators may want to set up their own remote access switches in order to offload some of the communications overhead involved in remote access from the RAS server, or to increase capacity. For instance, an Ascend MAX 4004 can handle 48 analog modem calls, while actually hanging that many modems off an NT server would cripple it. Here, we’ll look at two common remote access switches: the U.S. Robotics Total Control Enterprise Network Hub and the Ascend MAX 4004.

Configuring PPTP on a 3Com/U.S. Robotics Total Control Enterprise Network Hub

PPTP is available on 3Com/U.S. Robotics’s Total Control Enterprise Network Hub, beginning with Release 3.2 of their NETServer card firmware. The typical hub has one NETServer card, one ISDN PRI card with two ports (giving you a total of 23 64-Kbps channels), plus a total of 48 digital modems. There are three options for implementing PPTP on the U.S. Robotics switch: configuring global PPTP parameters, configuring a port for PPTP, or configuring a specific user for PPTP.

Setting up global PPTP parameters

You can set up the hub’s NETServer card with up to eight global PPTP RAS hosts. The NETServer card will use these hosts if a port or user has been set up for PPTP, but no specific RAS servers are specified. ...

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