Firebox II Description

The Firebox II is a rack-mountable, low-profile component, with an indicator display panel in front and physical interfaces in back. For a detailed description of other Firebox models, please see the Reference Guide.

Firebox II Front View

Firebox II indicators are on a central, back-lit indicator panel. From the left, the indicators are:

FIGURE 1. Firebox II -- Front View

Disarmed
Red light indicates the Firebox II is either in the processing of rebooting or it detected an error, shut down its interfaces, and will not forward any packets. In the latter condition, reboot the Firebox.

Armed
Green light indicates the Firebox II has been booted and is running.

Sys A
Steady -- Indicates that the Firebox is running a user-defined configuration.
Blinking --Indicates that the Firebox is running in enhanced system mode.

Sys B
Indicates that the Firebox II is running from the read-only factory default system area.

Security Triangle Display
Indicates traffic between Firebox II interfaces. Green arrows briefly light to indicate allowed traffic between two interfaces in the direction of the arrows. A red light at a triangle corner indicates that the Firebox is denying packets at that interface.

Traffic Volume Indicator
A stack of lights that functions as a meter to indicate levels of traffic volume through the Firebox II. Low volume indicators are green while, high volume indicators are yellow. The display updates three times per second. The scale is exponential: the first light represents 64 packets/second, the second light represents 128 packets/second, increasing to the eighth light, which represents 8,192 packets/second and is the ceiling of the scale, but not the Firebox.

Processor Load Indicator
A stack of lights that functions as a meter to indicate the system load average. The system load average is the average number of processes running (not including those in wait states) during the last minute. Low average indicators are green, while high average indicators are yellow. The display updates three times per second. The scale is exponential, with each successive light representing a doubling of the load average. The first light represents a load average of 0.15. The most significant load factor on a Firebox II is the number of proxies running.

A Firebox direct from the factory runs in Enhanced System Mode (Sys A). In this mode, the functions of some of the indicators are modified. For more information, see Hardware Descriptions and Firebox System Area chapters in the Reference Guide.

Firebox II Rear View

The rear view of the Firebox II contains ports and jacks for connectivity as well as a power switch. From the left, rear panel features are:

FIGURE 2. Firebox II -- Rear View

AC Receptacle
Accepts the detachable AC power cord supplied with the Firebox.

Power-On Light
Lights to indicate the Firebox II is receiving AC power.

Power Switch
Turns the Firebox II on or off.

PCMCIA Slots
Accept one PCMCIA (standard PC-style) modem card in either slot (but not both at once) to facilitate out-of-band management. The PCMCIA interface may be used for other options in the future.

Console Port
Connects to the Management Station or modem via a serial cable supplied with the
Firebox.

Serial Port
Included for future expansion.

FIGURE 3. Firebox II Ethernet Ports

Ethernet Ports
Indicators for each network interface display link status, card speed and activity. The network interface cards (NICs) are auto-sensing and adapt to wire speed automatically. The speed indictor lights when there is a good physical connection to the Firebox. When the card runs at 10 Mbit, the speed indicator is yellow. When the card runs at 100 Mbit, the speed indicator is green. The amber traffic indicator blinks when traffic is passing through the Firebox.