Patent ID: 7639624

Claim:
A method for monitoring network connectivity, comprising the acts of: transmitting a respective request packet from each network interface card (NIC) of a plurality of NICs in a NIC team to an external network device via different network segments to test connectivity of each network segment between the external network device and each respective NIC, each network segment being associated respectively and uniquely with one of the NICs of the NIC team, and each NIC having a different receive address, wherein: the external network device comprises an echo node having an Internet Protocol (IP) Address identified in each request packet, the echo node being configured upon receiving a request packet from a respective NIC to generate a response packet uniquely and specifically addressed to the respective NIC and different from the request packet, the NIC team functions when not monitoring network connectivity as a virtual NIC communicating with the external device through a NIC of the plurality of NICs designated as a primary NIC, each of remaining NICs provide separate and redundant network connectivity, and the NIC team shares an Internet Protocol (IP) address; receiving a respective response packet from the external network device at each respective NIC from which a respective request packet was received by the external network device; and if connectivity between the external network device and the primary NIC is not present and a response packet is not received from the external network device by the primary NIC, designating one of the remaining NICs as a new primary NIC.