topic Re: Guidance Needed: R82 T34 ClusterXL Bridge Mode Causing Loops & Crashes in Firewall and Security Management

Guidance Needed: R82 T34 ClusterXL Bridge Mode Causing Loops & Crashes

Balakrishna_Med — Mon, 01 Sep 2025 11:20:20 GMT

Hello Team,

We have recently deployed Check Point R82 Take 34 in bridge mode with ClusterXL (Active/Standby).

After a couple of hours, both gateways crashed. We observed:

Packet loops forming
Connections multiplying abnormally

When we reconfigured the cluster in Active/Active mode, everything worked as expected.

Environment data flow:

Perimeter firewall (Active/Passive) → Core switch (Active/Passive) → Check Point (Active/Active) → Aggregator switch

Additional details:

The firewall is operating in bridge mode.
On the core switch, STP is enabled, and it cannot be disabled on the ports connected to the Check Point appliances.
We are also noticing that SIP telephones restart every 1–1.5 hours, which seems to be related to this issue.

Request:
Could someone please guide me on the correct switch port configurations when connecting to Check Point in bridge mode? I want to avoid trial-and-error in the production environment.

Thanks in advance for your support.

Re: Guidance Needed: R82 T34 ClusterXL Bridge Mode Causing Loops & Crashes

PhoneBoy — Tue, 02 Sep 2025 14:52:34 GMT

ClusterXL bridge mode requires two or four switches per the documentation: https://sc1.checkpoint.com/documents/R81.20/WebAdminGuides/EN/CP_R81.20_Installation_and_Upgrade_Guide/Content/Topics-IUG/Configuring-ClusterXL-in-Bridge-Mode.htm?tocpath=Special%20Scenarios%20for%20Security%20Gateways%7CDeploying%20a%20Security%20Gateway%20or%20a%20ClusterXL%20in%20Bridge%20Mode%7CConfiguring%20a%20ClusterXL%20in%20Bridge%20Mode%7C_____0

With a single switch, Active/Active + STP is likely your best option, at least based on what I've seen in the past.

Re: Guidance Needed: R82 T34 ClusterXL Bridge Mode Causing Loops & Crashes

Balakrishna_Med — Fri, 05 Sep 2025 15:30:24 GMT

Hope there is issue with bridge mode in R82. not working