Associate
- Joined
- 15 Aug 2019
- Posts
- 6
- Location
- Yalding, Maidstone, Kent, UK
Hi guys, not a regular contributor but hoping some of you will be kind enough to lend me some advice.
I'm looking for a failover system to switch from my main broadband supplier to my backup in the event the main one goes down (which has been happening quite a lot recently).
Just to give a bit of background (a bit long-winded which I apologies for but I think this is all relevant) - I live in the sticks and it is not possible to get more than about 1 to 3 mbps with the mainstream ISPs. Believe me I've tried them all. There's a small local company called Call Flow Solutions who, don't ask me how, are able to supply a limited number of local villages (I think they only target their service at the villages they know can't get fibre yet) with what I deem to be an acceptable speed (around 80 mbps in my case), but at a premium (around £55pm IIRC and that doesn't include any phone or TV, it's internet only!)!
When I tried to sign up with them they tried to sell me their business package which apart from being nearly three times the price of the residential package I couldn't see that it offered any benefits whatsoever. They said I couldn't have the residential package because the phone number linked to my property comes up on Google as being a business number. I tried to argue the point that it's only for admin purposes, the line is on permanent divert to my mobile and no work actually takes place at my home and we have no employees who work here etc. but they were having none of it. To get round it I said ok then, install me a second line into the property, I'll keep my old line active and use that for business and use your new line solely for private use in my home. They made me pay about £120 to get the new line installed but it's saved me money in the long run by not having to have a business package.
I have kept my old line active:
a) because my business number is assigned to it which I need to keep active (I know there may be cheaper ways of transferring it to VOIP but I'm happy with it the way it is because the current package I'm on with EE is only about £25 per month IIRC and includes unlimited diverts to mobile numbers so basically I'm getting all those diverted calls to my mobile for free which I'm sure would be costing more in the long run paying by the minute with a VOIP service.
and b) because it does actually come in handy sometimes having the EE router set up on that line but turned off most of the time, when the Call Flow connection goes down (which didn't used to happen much but last few days has been happening quite frequently, maybe they're working on the network locally) I just turn the router on and switch the Ethernet cable from my PC to the CAll Flow router to the EE routeer. TBH I think I'm happy to pay the £25pm just to have a backup if Call Flow goes down like it keeps doing recently.
ANYWAY apologies for the essay but basically what I'm after is a way of easily switching from the Call Flow router to the EE router in the event the Call Flow service goes down. Automatically if possible but a manual switch would be ok I guess (not sure if that's possible to have like a box that two Ethernet cables go into one end and one Ethernet cable coming out the other with a switch on the box like A/B that switches from one input to the other?).
I did experiment a while back with a load balancing router but I found it had a negative effect on the overall internet speed. For example you'd be sat there streaming a video fine and all of a sudden you could tell it had switched to the EE router temporarily as it would go all pixilated or start buffering. Gaming became infuriating also. So don't really need the EE line to be used in conjunction at the same time as the Call Flow line as the Call Flow line is fast enough. Just need a method of switching from one to the other in the event of Call Flow going down. The load balancing router I got was a TP-LINK TL-R470T+ which I still have if there's actually a way of setting this up as a failover instead of just sharing the two connections equally all the time???
We have a WiFi mesh setup in our house so at the moment my desktop PC is plugged into one of the discs by Ethernet cable, everything else connects wirelessly. Problem with this is when Call Flow goes down, the Ethernet cable that goes from my PC to the Call Flow router I can unplug quickly and plug it into the EE router but that still leaves the rest of the house without WiFi unless I pull out all the routers and go through the cabling and rearrange it all which is agro considering it has to be put back again, and of course Call Flow might go down again a few minutes later which becomes as boring as reading this entire post to keep swapping the cabling over. Would rather have an automatic failover or a simple A/B switch to flick from one to the other.
Also worth noting Call Flow DO NOT allow the use of third party routers as I discovered to my expense after buying the most expensive multi-channel long range router I could find for about £350 IIRC. That was before moving over to a WiFi mesh which is much better now.
Any advice please?
I'm looking for a failover system to switch from my main broadband supplier to my backup in the event the main one goes down (which has been happening quite a lot recently).
Just to give a bit of background (a bit long-winded which I apologies for but I think this is all relevant) - I live in the sticks and it is not possible to get more than about 1 to 3 mbps with the mainstream ISPs. Believe me I've tried them all. There's a small local company called Call Flow Solutions who, don't ask me how, are able to supply a limited number of local villages (I think they only target their service at the villages they know can't get fibre yet) with what I deem to be an acceptable speed (around 80 mbps in my case), but at a premium (around £55pm IIRC and that doesn't include any phone or TV, it's internet only!)!
When I tried to sign up with them they tried to sell me their business package which apart from being nearly three times the price of the residential package I couldn't see that it offered any benefits whatsoever. They said I couldn't have the residential package because the phone number linked to my property comes up on Google as being a business number. I tried to argue the point that it's only for admin purposes, the line is on permanent divert to my mobile and no work actually takes place at my home and we have no employees who work here etc. but they were having none of it. To get round it I said ok then, install me a second line into the property, I'll keep my old line active and use that for business and use your new line solely for private use in my home. They made me pay about £120 to get the new line installed but it's saved me money in the long run by not having to have a business package.
I have kept my old line active:
a) because my business number is assigned to it which I need to keep active (I know there may be cheaper ways of transferring it to VOIP but I'm happy with it the way it is because the current package I'm on with EE is only about £25 per month IIRC and includes unlimited diverts to mobile numbers so basically I'm getting all those diverted calls to my mobile for free which I'm sure would be costing more in the long run paying by the minute with a VOIP service.
and b) because it does actually come in handy sometimes having the EE router set up on that line but turned off most of the time, when the Call Flow connection goes down (which didn't used to happen much but last few days has been happening quite frequently, maybe they're working on the network locally) I just turn the router on and switch the Ethernet cable from my PC to the CAll Flow router to the EE routeer. TBH I think I'm happy to pay the £25pm just to have a backup if Call Flow goes down like it keeps doing recently.
ANYWAY apologies for the essay but basically what I'm after is a way of easily switching from the Call Flow router to the EE router in the event the Call Flow service goes down. Automatically if possible but a manual switch would be ok I guess (not sure if that's possible to have like a box that two Ethernet cables go into one end and one Ethernet cable coming out the other with a switch on the box like A/B that switches from one input to the other?).
I did experiment a while back with a load balancing router but I found it had a negative effect on the overall internet speed. For example you'd be sat there streaming a video fine and all of a sudden you could tell it had switched to the EE router temporarily as it would go all pixilated or start buffering. Gaming became infuriating also. So don't really need the EE line to be used in conjunction at the same time as the Call Flow line as the Call Flow line is fast enough. Just need a method of switching from one to the other in the event of Call Flow going down. The load balancing router I got was a TP-LINK TL-R470T+ which I still have if there's actually a way of setting this up as a failover instead of just sharing the two connections equally all the time???
We have a WiFi mesh setup in our house so at the moment my desktop PC is plugged into one of the discs by Ethernet cable, everything else connects wirelessly. Problem with this is when Call Flow goes down, the Ethernet cable that goes from my PC to the Call Flow router I can unplug quickly and plug it into the EE router but that still leaves the rest of the house without WiFi unless I pull out all the routers and go through the cabling and rearrange it all which is agro considering it has to be put back again, and of course Call Flow might go down again a few minutes later which becomes as boring as reading this entire post to keep swapping the cabling over. Would rather have an automatic failover or a simple A/B switch to flick from one to the other.
Also worth noting Call Flow DO NOT allow the use of third party routers as I discovered to my expense after buying the most expensive multi-channel long range router I could find for about £350 IIRC. That was before moving over to a WiFi mesh which is much better now.
Any advice please?
