Load balancer
- A load balancer may also be called a content switch or content filter.
- A network appliance that is used to load balance between multiple hosts that contain the same data-spreading out the workload for greater efficiency.
- Commonly used to distribute the requests (workload) to a server farm among the various servers, helping to ensure that no single server gets overloaded
Proxy server
- A proxy server is an appliance that requests resources on behalf of client machines.
- It is often used to retrieve resources from outside untrusted networks on behalf of the requesting client.
- It hides and protects the requesting client.
- It can also be utilized to filter allowed content.
- It can increase network performance by caching commonly requested Web pages
