Load Balancing two FTTC connections

rtho782

rtho782

rtho782

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So I've been playing with two FTTC connections (one Talktalk, one Plusnet, for resiliency).

Connectify Dispatch is very good at load balancing and makes it pretty seamless. It insists on having a NIC for each route, rather than just two gateways on the same NIC, so I've had to put 2nd NICs in the two PCs I'm using it on (then just connect both NICs to the same switch and it runs on different subnets).

I thought I'd try a more "hardware" solution and picked up a Draytek 2860ac. We use the N version at work and it works well, but we don't load balance with it (just failover, or specific IP ranges via specific WANs).

It's awful.

Draytek apparently don't know the meaning of the word "balance" as this just shoves all traffic down a single WAN ignoring the other.

I'm about to send it back and build a ClearOS box. Any thoughts?
 
tp link do a couple of load balance box/router combo's

just remember not every internet source can use two lines at the same time

peer to peer is the only thing i can think of that can off the top of my head
 
I think the Draytek is doing the right thing. If you are downloading a large file or going through a speedtest site, you'll find it'll likely only use one line. It's just not possible for it to use both for the same TCP connection (it might even be smarter and assume that it should stick the same source and destination addresses to the same line). If you use p2p/torrents as suggested you might see a balance when using the Draytek as each connection to a different peer might be assigned evenly to different lines.

The reason you will get a balance when using connectify is that the app on your computer can send packets down either line, then their server will be able to recieve and reorder them so they can be sent to the service you are connecting to. That service will only see the packets coming from 1 IP address.

I've seen very problematic behaviour using load balancing the way you are suggesting, especially with banking websites, where sometimes your first connection will be made using line 1 and the next 'click' will make a new connection using the second line which will log you out.

The only real solutions that won't cause you a problem are either having a 'gateway' at your home using Connectify, using another solution such as Sharedband, or changing to an ISP that supports bonding lines. AAISP is the only one I can think of atm.
 
Even with two different computers sending traffic, and the one sending the majority of the traffic using Bittorrent, it still only uses one line.

Many speedtest sites use more than one TCP connection - e.g. Speedtest.net. Thinkbroadband does two tests, a x1 test (which should have course max one line only) and a x6 test (which with connectify maxes both lines).

Steam downloads are multiple connections, and with connectify I see both lines utilised.

I've actually found that if I repeatedly pause and restart steam downloads, the draytek will (~5% of the time) decide to distribute the connections correctly and I'll use both lines.

http://imgur.com/P8U9ZYE <--- shows a very biased "balance".

I worked around this to a point by setting the router to route 128.0.0.0/1 over WAN2, so half the IPv4 address space went over one connection and half over the other. Worked well for torrents.

I've sent the router back now, I'm living with Connectify until I get round to building a ClearOS or pfSense box from random spare parts.
 
I'd consider looking at..

Ubiquiti Edgerouter series
Mikrotik

They're both around the same price point as high end consumer grade kit, but far more powerful.

Looking into one of them as my next router.
 
bledd. said:
I'd consider looking at..

Ubiquiti Edgerouter series
Mikrotik

They're both around the same price point as high end consumer grade kit, but far more powerful.

Looking into one of them as my next router.
Click to expand...

2nd the mikrotik call.
I got an rb2011 last week and it's bloomin amazing what it can do.
 
Steveocee said:
2nd the mikrotik call.
I got an rb2011 last week and it's bloomin amazing what it can do.
Click to expand...

I'm looking at them right now, there doesn't seem to be much in terms of info about, which is annoying!

Were I to use a 2011UiAS-IN (seems no point in the WiFi version as I'll end up using an 802.11ac router as an access point, I have a couple), would it cope with two PPPoE connections?

I feel like 600MHz cpu is a bit wimpy, and the device is almost too cheap at £100!!
 
Yeah it'll cope without problems. When you start loading routing rules the CPU usage can rise a bit but it's nothing to worry about.

I had the same thoughts about a 600Mhz CPU but it's some specific routing processor apparently so can hold it's own very well. There are a few using the same chip, CRS125, RB2011 and the RB-951 all use the same CPU.

Try http://routerboard.com/ for info on them, there are some tables at the bottom that show routing performance.
 
Given it's less than £100 I think I'm gonna just order one, it's worth that much just to add to my pile of gadgets and play with it :)
 
pfsense multi wan?

Worked well when i had two LLU ADSL connections and you can set traffic rules for certain traffic etc? Free but you need the hardware (2 x modem/routers, 3 PCI Network cards, machine to run pfsense etc)
 
Last edited:
lemzip said:
pfsense multi wan?

Worked well when i had two LLU ADSL connections and you can set traffic rules for certain traffic etc? Free but you need the hardware (2 x modem/routers, 3 PCI Network cards, machine to run pfsense etc)
Click to expand...

Exactly what I was going to do (that or ClearOS). I have a couple of PCIe NICs laying around, and an i5 3570 + z77 motherboard, but it means an ATX PC in the hallway.

I have some random MiniITX boards, but they are only Atoms, and only have one NIC and one PCIe slot.

If the mikrotik does the job and is 11w TDP and small, so much the better.
 
yep and no running pc for that, was a pain for the mrs to remember to boot up the other pc for internet when i was not round.

It does have power management but not to 11w for sure.

good luck
 
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