Dual Wan Routers

So I moved a few months ago and haven't been happy with Frontier DSL for my ISP. I usually get 8 mbps download and 0.4 up (supposed to be 12mbps down). So when it became available I signed up for Tnet, which is a microwave based wireless ISP that is supposed to get 15 down and roughly 8 up. Right now neither one or the other is getting more than about 5 down. The frontier recently became more reliable in the 8 down range but Tnet is experiencing problems with their backbone (fiber) provider. They hope to soon resolve the current issue while bringing in a faster line for the future. (at times because of the backbone issues and the number of connected home the bandwidth drops to 0.5mbps. The backbone provider dropped them from a 500mbps connection down to 250mbps. They hope to restore the 500 meg line and later install a 10 gbps line for the backbone. Town pop is roughly 2,700 plus outlying areas and not sure how many connections that represents)

So I am looking at dual wan routers with load balancing to use both connections and to have to router failover in case one fails and failback when that line comes back on. I have a gamer and the wife and I watch a lot of netflix (we like it in hd mode) and these often occur at the same time (biggest reason I need more bandwidth than frontier could reliably offer, but since Tnet is also not reliable in the short term I want to combine them). We sometimes surf the net while all this is going on with one of the laptops or iphones/ipad. I have a Netgear Nighthawk R7000 AC 1900 wireless router with advanced QoS and all these and the chromecast will connect to this before before being routed through the dual wan router. This is for my home, in case you couldn't tell. In addition to all these activities I sometimes connect to the work server through a work laptop to get documentation done at home.

I've looked at Peplink Balance 20 and it seems to have everything I want but at $299 the price is up there. TP Link TL r470/480+ look OK as do the 51xx and 62xx models. Even the syslink models and Cisco v042 look sufficient for less than $200 and several for about $100, but every model except the Peplink seems to lack one feature or another. Of those, the TP Link TL r480+ seems the most proficient but I've also seen some Asus options that might do.

I know we have some IT/IS guys here and so was looking to tap your expertise and experiences. Needed features are some versions of load balancing (prefereably some intelligent version - especially one the senses traffic load and need and routes according), failover, and failback. I'm not using vpn in most cases or nat. I'm not looking to combine bandwidths for the same download unless the router can dynamically shift back and forth so https problems don't crop up.

I love the Peplink but I don't think I will be able to convince the wife the expense is worth it and so I am hoping one of the others might get most of what I want done for $100 give or take since I can probably get away with that. Alternatively, if you knew of a used Peplink on the cheap from a good source...

Any help you can provide would be appreciated.

I'm used to it because I don't live in the HSV. Lived in T-Town for a bit and that was about 20 down(roughly 10 years ago on Comcast). Netflix dynamically adjusts picture quality and it sometimes even has to buffer. Everything can get quite congested and as of now we can't do the majority of what we want because of the unrealable connection on either isp. That's why I'm looking to use both in a load balancing scenario and need a failover with failback. Right now it's unbearable at times. I'm hoping when the short term issues the isp is having are resolved that we will have more capability and reliability. Then we when that happens we should have about 10-12 on frontier and 15 with tnet down and a combined 5-8 up. Keep in mind we are 97 miles or more from the closest metro of considerable size (Klamath Falls) and Redding is even further away.

2003TIDE said:

That speed sounds pretty standard for wireless and DSL lines. Google dual wan routers. Never used one. It isn't really something my company does in the enterprise world because asymmetric routing causes headaches. We go the active/passive route.

FYI i think $299 sounds cheap for what you are asking for. You are getting outside of standard home use equipment so it is going to be more expensive for those advanced features.

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I agree. The wife doesn't. So failing to convince her looking at the cheaper alternatives (which usually don't turn out like I want but sometimes there's a good cheaper option). i have googled pretty extensively and looked at specs and reviews as well as the customer ratings. By far the pep link has the better reviews and ratings with others grouped far behind. Was hoping someone had experience and I could find that needle in a haystack.

P.S. I double checked myself on this and Netflix recommends 5megs for HD and 25 for UHD which is slightly more bandwidth on HD than directv's codec requires. Gaming needs more upstream and faster pings. Even 15/5 is enough to do most things for us if it's reliable except for those times we might have, say, a DirecTV movie download going in the background with all the rest going on Frontier is better since I got the nighthawk (had lost my old wifi router in the move).

TIDE-HSV said:

The Nighthawk made quite a difference in my home. We have a business computer which is at least 75' from the router. With a little amplifier, that machine gets around 30 DL...

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We were running into problems with wifi chromecasting an amazon video browser tab (don't want the clutter of another similar device). Lag was horrible because the modem's built in wifi is pathetic, of course. The Nighthawk fixed that side of things. It's a great router with QoS and lots of bandwidth. The WRT54G linksys did an adequate job before it disappeared. I'll probably find it a year from now.

I do wish we could get even modern cable speeds here but that is not in the cards. Running fiber this far out has to be pretty expensive but if they can get the 10 gig line by the fall we might get a nice speed bump.

P.S. 30 feet through 2 walls is my furthest/worst connection and it does well.

Apparently for this provider it is only a 500 mbps fiber line.

I have found pfsense, which is software that can turn my old unused laptop into a very powerful router with dual wan function for the cost of 2 usb 2.0 to 10/100 ethernet adapters and 2 rj45 cables ($70 or even less, depending on where purchased). It seems it has load balancing and failover. It also has a LOT of other tools as well. Might be going this route.

EDIT: Will probably do a $40 managed switch instead and use vlan instead of usb adapters.

Well, I didn't want to have the expense of a managed switch (even at $40 - give or take) - or the added complexity of VLAN's, so I used ZeroShell firewall/router software which recognized my USB NIC's right off the bat. ZeroShell is Linux based as opposed to freeBSD so that's probably where the better hardware support is from. With Frontier I'm getting about 7 mbps and usually between 1-2 mbps with TNET.

Frontier had found I was plugged into a bad port at the CO. Jack is the local guy and a USC Trojan, but he's the only one who found the source of the problem and at least has me stable, although I'm still not happy with the bandwidth as it's far slower that it's supposed to be. Peak I have gotten is above 10 mbps. I cancelled the phone we never use and some add-on security suite and the bill dropped from $130 to $29 when the lady on the phone said she had a deal for me.

TNET has struck a deal with another fiber provider and say they will have the new connection "soon". They comped me this month's charges without my having to ask. The peak I've gotten with them is about 8 mbps, but mostly 1-2 mbps and very unstable and as low as 0.2. Neither service provider has a contract so I can drop either at any time if/when I get tired of this.

I have the ZeroShell loaded onto an old laptop which previously had a broken screen. I switched the screen out with one from an even older laptop and it works. For the Load Balancing I have Frontier weight 6:1 against TNet with failovers in place in case one goes down. Changed the DNS settings for the Nighthawk to use google and opendns and immediately noticed a snappier experience. It's still a work in progress and not everything is perfect yet but it is better than before. We can watch Netflix pretty reliably again. I'm still hoping that both providers have some issues solved in the next couple of months so we have >25 mbps between the 2 of them soon so we have have always smooth video and gaming and surfing and working at once. It's beautiful country out here but it is remote and so we have to deal with what we've got.

Meanwhile....my next project is a cell signal booster. Probably going with a professional install on this one, however, since I don't want to dc outlet in the front taken up by the booster as I use it as a charge hub.

Just an update:

Tnet finally solved their fiber/backbone problem with a new connection with Centurylink. I saw no improvement until the tech came out today and fixed the setup here at the house with their equipment. Not sure what he did since I wasn't here, but I did tweak a few firewall and DNS settings tonight and currently I'm getting about 6 mbps on each connection and all sites seem to be working properly. So I believe the setup on my end is finally good and the setup with each ISP is OK and at least more reliable (and in Tnet's case 5-10x as fast). That's better than before so I'll take it. Should be able to stream and work and game and surf pretty efficiently now.

On a side note(rather than starting a new thread): I did pick up a SolidRF 4g cell signal booster. Pretty simple setup and supports multiple users. I've been using it about a week now and there is only one spot I always lose connection now (just outside of the town where I've been working where the mountain must completely block the signal) and 2 spots that are really iffy. But my connection the rest of the way is pretty solid and I get fair to good signal through most of the canyon where I used to get none for a few miles. Most of this problem will go away in a few days when I start work right here in town instead of driving nearly 60 miles one-way (same employer), but we'll have fewer dropped connections on trips out of town from now on so still worth it. No. CA terrain is pretty rough. We drop nearly 4,000 ft just from here to Redding with a number of ups and downs along the way. It's pretty much back country (with a few very small towns) in any direction for at least 100 miles. I know we'll get to test it when Star Trek: Beyond comes out.