[TriLUG] Networking question

[Stephen Hoffman]

    This is probably a simple question, but I have been unsuccessful in
finding the solution.

History:
One machine connected to two networks (with two network cards).  Both
networks get to the internet, but one is connected directly to the
internet on a T1, the other is NAT'd and shared on a seperate T1, but is
dreadfully slow.

I want to ensure that I always default to eth0 for internet and only use
eth1 for requests on the internal network.  I didn't think this would be
any issue, but on occasion I notice that my request hops on the internal
network for larger downloads at roughly 50K slower speeds.

I have been trying to set the metric on the interface to give preference
to the faster card, but keep getting an error when I attempt to bring the
card up passing the metric option.  I get the following:
     SIOCSIFMETRIC: Operation not supported   (google's no help on this one)

Am I going about this the wrong way?  Is there a better way?  Would it be
better to set the metric in the route table?  if so, how can I make it
come up that way automatically?

Any help greatly appreciated!

Steve