Query on PA acting as load balancer

[FarzanaMustafa]

We are using VM-100 and would like to use this as a load balancer for our Web services.

We have checked the link below and would like to know if this EMCP load balance incoming traffic to Web servers? Or does this just load balance egress traffic between 2 different ISP’s?

https://knowledgebase.paloaltonetworks.com/KCSArticleDetail?id=kA10g000000ClF8CAK

[BPry · Accepted solution]

@FarzanaMustafa,

The article that you have listed is specifically talking about load balancing 2 different ISPs. Your VM-100s are capable of performing route based ECMP.

Here's the thing with load-balancing directly on the Palo-Alto's for something like web services; can you get this to work, absolutely, should you, no. Setup an actual load-balancer like haproxy or some other solution behind your firewall and use the right tool for the job. Hacking together a solution that allows the VM-100 to function like a load-balancer makes for a very sad looking configuration and adds unnecessary complexity where it doesn't need to exist. 

[Vikashh]

@BPry 

Still if we think to configure for WebService (I mean the way @FarzanaMustafa asked), is it possible, will it work?

[OtakarKlier]

Hello,

Honestly you are better off using a load balancer.

Regards,

[BPry]

@Vikashh,

I'm not going to detail how you can make this function, because you shouldn't use your firewall as a load-balancer. There are many open-source solutions you could throw on any available piece of hardware that would work far better and actually be supported.