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A static route is a setting that explicitly specifies the route to use for packets, according to one of the following criteria:
Packets that match the criteria for a specific static route are sent to the route's defined destination, or next hop, which can be a specific gateway's IP address or an Internet connection. Specifying an Internet connection as the static route's next hop is useful in cases where the ISP's default gateway IP address is dynamically assigned to the gateway, as this approach allows you to route traffic to the Internet connection by specifying its name, instead of a static IP address.
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Note: If the static route's next hop is an Internet connection that is currently unavailable, the UTM-1 appliance sends matching traffic through the static route with the next-lowest metric. |
Packets with a source, destination, or network service that do not match any defined static route are routed to the default gateway. To modify the default gateway, see Using a LAN Connection.
When a static route is based on the packet's source, it is called a source route. Source routing can be used, for example, for load balancing between two Internet connections. For instance, if you have an Accounting department and a Marketing department, and you want each to use a different Internet connection for outgoing traffic, you can add a static route specifying that traffic originating from the Accounting department should be sent via WAN1, and another static route specifying that traffic originating from the Marketing department should be sent via WAN2.
A static route that is based on the network service used to send the packet is called a service route. Service routing is useful for directing all traffic of a particular type to a specific Internet connection. For example, you can choose to route all HTTP traffic to the secondary Internet connection, while routing all other traffic to the primary Internet connection. Service routes can be defined for network service objects, enabling you to create routes for custom protocols and port ranges.
The Static Routes page lists all existing routes, including the default, and indicates whether each route is currently "Up" (reachable) or not.
