MLPPP with a Cisco 1720, or Linux box?

Rainmaker

Rainmaker

Rainmaker

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Hi guys,

I figured this was worth a thread of its own :) My contract with UK Online is up in September, and I've been looking forward to moving to Be Pro for the extra upload. I'm currently SYNCed at 20.5 megs downstream with an SNR of 6 (ID 64). On Be Pro I'm hoping that with FastPath and a target SNRm of 3dB I'll get closer to 23+ megs/sec SYNC. This should be easily possible, as even on UK Online with a high interleave depth I can SYNC at almost 23 megs with an SNR of 3 (manually set via DMT or DGTeam firmware).

Anyways, I've been thinking of getting a 2nd phone line and bonding 2x Be Pro lines via MLPPP, which Be allow. With BT's offer for a new line at £29.99 I'm seriously looking at doing this now.

I'm told that the Cisco 1720 has the built-in capability to bond 2x ADSL lines automagically, and I can pick one up on ebay for <£100 easily. Has anyone got any experience with this, or any tips/advice they can offer? My alternative is to built a basic Linux box out of older hardware and put 3x NICs in it.

For up to 48 megs down and 5 megs up I cant wait :D
Cheers,

Lee
 
Tolien, I don't know when Be started doing this (or if they've always offered it) but it's definitely possible :) There's a vid on youtube which won an official Be competition looking for the best customer video promoting Be's services. The guy was running 2x Be lines over MLPPP for an almost 50 meg connection using a Linux box as the bonding device :)

rick, I'll check that link out now - cheers. I'm going to use 2x AM200s to actually connect (they're modems in half-bridge) and then either a Cisco 1720 or a stand-alone Linux box to bond the lines. If possible I'll chain that on to my WRT54GL for the LAN/wifi side. I'm still looking around at the best options - hence this post :)

Tomato firmware has a mod available for true MLPPP bonding on 2 ADSL lines, but it's Canadian based and probably won't support ~48 megs throughput :( The idea is you load the modded firmware, plug a second modem into one of the LAN switch ports and the WRT54GL automatically bonds that to the connection on the WAN port = full MLPPP :D
 
I've emailed Be about this for more info, but from what I'm told so far the DSLAM handles the MLPPP at their end, I literally just need to plug in my two modems to a dual-WAN router or dedi Linux box to "finish" the MLPPP at my end - so long as my end is configured properly anyway obviously :)

I'm gonna try to contact the guy from youtube who already has Be MLPPP set up and working, to see if he can shed any light on the situation.
 
Nice ninja edit tolien :p

Wesley, you call BS but why would Be give the guy the prize if they knew it was impossible to do? LOL My mate has also had independent confirmation from Be that they support MLPPP :)
 
The email my mate got from Be (with personal info removed obviously):

[FONT=&quot]From:[/FONT][FONT=&quot] Be member services [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: 16 June 2008 15:24
To: [email protected]
Subject: Ticket No. xxxxxxx updated Successfully[/FONT]

Dear xxxxx xxxxx, Thank you for contacting us. It is possible to bond 2 or more lines. However bear in mind, that we do not support it and you will need to configure it yourself. If you have any other enquiries, feel free to contact us again. Regards, Slav Be*team
Click to expand...


;)
 
More trouble than it's worth to them, probably. Enabling MLPPP at their end isn't really any skin off their nose. But having 1,000s of n00b customers phoning their 0800 number asking what they do now their broadband is live?

Imagine the tech support they'd need to talk all those people through setting up and running a Linux box to bond the lines, or else telling folks they'd have to buy an expensive dual-wan router and set it up! That's the only thing I can think of anyway.
 
The easiest way to do it (for me) is going to be:

1) Buy an extra AM200 from OcUK (I already have one)
2) Set them up in bridge mode
3) Plug them into a Cisco 1720 (or pre-configured LiveCD Router box with 3x NICs)
4) Output the 1720 or LiveCD Router box to my WRT54GL for LAN-side wifi etc

I'm waiting to hear from Be now, but if it is all as it appears, I'll order my new line tomorrow :)
 
wesley said:
what's wrong with using 2 x bebox instead? would save further £30 for an extra Am200
Click to expand...

Na I really like my WRT54GL and the AM200 is rock solid. Much better than the Be-box (which has flakey wifi etc). Besides, the BeBox doesn't have a built-in bridge/half-bridge only mode, you have to manually apply IP templates etc etc :o Easier/better to just get another AM200, unless the BeBox has changed and I didn't know about it? More than willing to give it a try anyways.

And yeah, as/when this comes off I'll make a step-by step with pics/screenshots etc for posterity.
 
You posted the 1720 pic as I was writing my last reply, sorry I missed it. I must have read wrong ??? The page I read earlier said the 1720 supports MLPPP. I'll have another dig around - either way the model isn't too important, the fact there ARE dual WAN routers that are MLPPP capable is what counts :D Worst comes to worse it's easy enough to build your own.
 
Nice looking router wesley, but it seems it only supports redundancy and load balancing, NOT MLPPP :( The only Vigor I can find that DOES support MLPPP is over £250 and has a maximum speed of 128k LOL
 
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wesley said:
ok, seems to be lots of hassle, 4 boxes in total

2 routers ------cisco 2720/linux box-------router/switch
Click to expand...

Depends on what you call hassle :D I already run an external modem attached to a router, so for me it's only two more boxes (an extra modem and a "bonding device" of some sort). Two extra (tiny) boxes for a total of almost 50 megs unthrottled, unlimited downloads? Where do I sign? :p
 
Upstream's Bonded ADSL Linux CD is a dedicated bonding distro, but you have to pay a subscription to them annually (£23 per NIC!) or your WAN won't connect.

I'm leaning towards selling my WRT/DG834GT/2091 and buying a nice new Gigabit draft 2 N wifi router such as the D-Link DIR-655 (which can put through ~300 megs actual from WAN to LAN). I can build a small flash-based Linux box as a custom bonding machine (3x NICs) and plug that in. Debian or any other distro would be fairly easy to set up for MPPP and would run nicely on such a machine.

Lots of options. I'm going to speak to BT in a moment to ask whether the £29.99 line install is still valid (one of the replies on that thread said the offer expired at the end of June, but I couldn't see that in the PDF).
 
Hmm.. Just to muddy the waters a bit. Remember the email I pasted in here, from a Be techie confirming to my friend that they support MPPP? Here's one that *I* just received (I emailed them before my mate told me he'd beaten me to it lol):

Dear Rainmaker,

Thank you for contacting us.

We are excited about your decision to join Be*.
Nevertheless you should be aware that we do not support MLPPP as it is not used for ADSL but for LANs with multiple dial-up or ISDN lines. Our connection runs over RFC 1483 protocol.


Kind regards,
Be*Team
Click to expand...


So, one guy says yes, another says no. Time to speak to Head Office before I pay for a 2nd BT line me thinks. Gotta give UK Online their due, they're never this indecisive/mis-informed :o
 
Yeah but don't forget we've had one Be techie confirm via email that they DO support MLPPP.... I'm on the phone to them now (on hold) to get some clarification.

EDIT - I'm guessing this is level 1 support. Some Bulgarian chap who sighs a lot and has asked me to repeat x3 what I want to do. He's STILL asking for my account number (I've told him several times I'm not a customer yet) and asking me to tell him again what I want "for this bonding".

Is it hard to get escalated? :(
 
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OK, I take back what I just said. Nikolai (spelling?) came back and explained VERY carefully to me that:

1) YES, Be's DSLAMS are CONFIGURED to work if the customer was to know how to set up true MLPPP bonding.

2) NO if you get stuck they WON'T help you out or tell you how to do it. Not. Their. Problem :p However if you DO have a capable device or dedi Linux box, you can easily configure and use MLPPP for up to 48 megs down, 5 megs up. I got him to repeat that very clearly and authoritatively. It WILL work :D
 
Well if that happened you wait for the 3 month contract on the 2nd Be account to pass and just cancel. In the meantime you at least have an (inferior) load balanced multi-threaded connection.

But in my case I have a good mate who works for a hosting company and works with Linux/networking in a data centre for a living. He can MLPPP my line in his sleep so WIN!
 
Yeah, but in my case I qualify for BT Light due to my disability, which means I'm exempt from the 18 month contract and can cancel it at any time without penalty. Another win :D
 
wesley said:
i cant see anywhere on pfsense website for supporting MLPPP
Click to expand...

I've never used pfsense, but most Linux distros (ordinary desktop ones) can support bonding; eg Debian, Ubuntu. The pppd just needs a bit of tweakage and a couple of companion packages downloading. You set an alias to create a link for "eth0 and eth1 = br0" and br0 is your new bonded connection.

Overly simplistic, but that's the gist of it. Of course there are other bits that need tweaking but what I'm saying is essentially it's easy to modify the pppd et al. to run a bonded connection in Linux.
 
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