SDN¶
SDN stands for Software Defined Network. With it, you can interconnect multiple services together in a private network and access advanced features like internet access and VPN access.
At realtoxmedia, our services and network are build on top of an EVPN-VXLAN architecture. With this design, we can provide a highly scalable and flexible network.
Together with our netbox-based automation and config generation, you can manage all your Switch&Router-Ports (Colocation/Dedicated Server/Transit), VPS NICs and even network-attachments to managed services based on kubernetes in our portal in full self-service and connect them together in private networks.
L2VPN "VLANs" ./. L3VPN Networks¶
We have two different ways of connecting your services together, both of which you can use.
L2VPNs / "VLANs"¶
You can image an L2VPN as a pure VLAN.
No router from us, no advanced services, no firewalling, no IP-Assignment, no DHCP/Routing/Internet Access etc.
In most cases, it does not make sense to use them directly.
Some Services like our managed services on kubernetes-based infrastructure can also only be used with L3VPNs.Technical Information
Each L2VPN is a VXLAN VNI. We connect your services together via EVPN-VXLAN.
L2VPNs are either attached as a tagged VLAN to a switch port (Colocation/Dedicated Server/Transit) or as an additional network device (VPS/Kubernetes) to your service.
L3VPNs / "SDN Networks"¶
These Networks are the feature you will use in most cases. They are fully managed by us and provide you with all the features you need to connect your services together in a private network.
In a Network, you have one or more Subnets. Each Subnet has an IPv4 and IPv6 prefix associated with it. Inside the Subnets, the first usable IP is used by us as the Gateway for your services.
We provide DHCP for all IPs you create inside a subnet.
You can route traffic between multiple subnets in the same Network and apply firewall rules to the traffic between them. You can also add e.g. static routes to your services, so they can reach other networks.
Furthermore, you can add NAT-based Internet Access to a Network or enable VPN-Access via Wireguard.
The possibilities are endless, and you can create complex network topologies with multiple subnets, routing, firewalling and more - all with highly available infrastructure managed by us!Technical Information
Each L3VPN is a VRF. So a seperate Routing Table is created for each Network.
The Gateway IPs are anycasted on at least two routers. NAT and Wireguard are also highly available and redundant, we use kubernetes with multos and a custom evpn-vxlan operator for this internally.
Each Subnet has one Underlay L2VPN/VNI, which will get attached to your services similarly to L2VPNs.
Architecture Examples¶
Management Network for Colocation Servers: Network with VPN, Internet Access ; assigned to physical ports.