Dual WAN or should I ???

[bboncorr1]

For multiple reasons I have 2 internet connections running to my home. I currently have Fidium. (1GiG) & Xfinity (1.2 GiG) running to my home. My equipment is a (ONT/Modem) Fidium , Netgear, (routers) Asus AXE16000, Asus AX11000, Netgear Nighthawk R7000.

Currently I’m running the AXE16000 as primary with others as extenders. After weeks of research and learning workaround tricks for dual WAN “load balancing” I’ve finally gotten it to work but there’s been issues with dropped and unstable connections. Sometimes the connection will just freeze out and I’ll have to reset the handshake to the router.

I’m wondering what the consensus is with the way I currently have it connected vs just setting up 2 independent connections. Any advice would be welcome as well.

 

[degrub]

You will likely want to shift to a SMB or home made router to handle 1) the full bandwidth of the ISP connections, 2) dual wan load balancing and switchover.

there are a number of threads under the \router subforum and elsewhere here.

 

[Tech9]

Sometimes the connection will just freeze out and I’ll have to reset the handshake to the router.

Multiple threads about Asuswrt Dual WAN issues. The only true fix is something else doing Dual WAN management for you.

 

[Tech Junky]

The other option to what @degrub described is to go with a PC and put it together yourself. pfSense

How to configure pfSense as multi wan (DUAL WAN) load balance failover router

How do I setup a multi-WAN load balancing and failover on pfSense router with two ADSL or cable or leased-line or FTTH (Fiber to the home) connections?

www.cyberciti.biz

I run a DIY setup because of a few reasons like not wanting to spend more money on junk from companies like you listed that push FW updates that fix one thing and break others in the process. The other reason is they're over priced for the HW you get. I want stability and performance but, then again I'm also cheap when it comes to finding the best prices on the components I have in mind. Putting together a system isn't hard if you can follow walk thru posts and have some idea of how networking works.

By customizing a PC into a router I was also able to fold in a few other devices and collapse things into a single box. I pulled in the DVR / TV tuners / NAS / AP functions and some other stuff in the process. Setting up the FW rules is fairly easy to do if you just edit them in notepad vs running all of the command line options. It can be as simple or complicated as you want to make things though. Taking back the power from these companies though charging hundreds for these devices feels good.

The other option is bonding the two connections through a FW like https://help.firewalla.com/hc/en-us/articles/360051575473-Firewalla-Feature-Guide-Multi-WAN

The issue here might be the same with a bottleneck due to design. With a DIY setup you can tinker under the hood a bit more and setup different versions of load balancing. Also, you'll have more choices as to the NIC you want to use whether it's a quad port / dual port 2.5gbps or something higher to allow for higher capacity data on the LAN or prepping for higher bandwidth in the future.

 

[bboncorr1]

Multiple threads about Asuswrt Dual WAN issues. The only true fix is something else doing Dual WAN management for you.

That’s what I’m afraid of. Guess I’m just trying to hold on and figure out something that can’t be fixed as it’s currently setup.

 

[bboncorr1]

The other option to what @degrub described is to go with a PC and put it together yourself. pfSense

How to configure pfSense as multi wan (DUAL WAN) load balance failover router

How do I setup a multi-WAN load balancing and failover on pfSense router with two ADSL or cable or leased-line or FTTH (Fiber to the home) connections?

www.cyberciti.biz

I run a DIY setup because of a few reasons like not wanting to spend more money on junk from companies like you listed that push FW updates that fix one thing and break others in the process. The other reason is they're over priced for the HW you get. I want stability and performance but, then again I'm also cheap when it comes to finding the best prices on the components I have in mind. Putting together a system isn't hard if you can follow walk thru posts and have some idea of how networking works.

By customizing a PC into a router I was also able to fold in a few other devices and collapse things into a single box. I pulled in the DVR / TV tuners / NAS / AP functions and some other stuff in the process. Setting up the FW rules is fairly easy to do if you just edit them in notepad vs running all of the command line options. It can be as simple or complicated as you want to make things though. Taking back the power from these companies though charging hundreds for these devices feels good.

The other option is bonding the two connections through a FW like https://help.firewalla.com/hc/en-us/articles/360051575473-Firewalla-Feature-Guide-Multi-WAN

The issue here might be the same with a bottleneck due to design. With a DIY setup you can tinker under the hood a bit more and setup different versions of load balancing. Also, you'll have more choices as to the NIC you want to use whether it's a quad port / dual port 2.5gbps or something higher to allow for higher capacity data on the LAN or prepping for higher bandwidth in the future.

My understanding is bonding isn’t an option because they are not the same type. Fidium is fiber so they use ONT’s and Xfinity is over copper using a modem. That was the first option I looked into last year.

 

[Tech Junky]

My understanding is bonding isn’t an option because they are not the same type. Fidium is fiber so they use ONT’s and Xfinity is over copper using a modem. That was the first option I looked into last year.

And they both have Ethernet to the router.

The issue that comes up in the metric used based on the bandwidth as it will prefer the higher bandwidth over the other. You can play with these settings though in route statements to prefer one over the other based on needs. If you get a dual port 2.5 nic then bonding isn't an issue for full bandwidth if both CPE devices establish links at full speed.

I did this with an mb8600 and 2 ports for lacp and got the full bandwidth from cable. So, if you're modem has a 2.5 port and the ont has one as well it should be simple. Even using a quad port and assigning two ports to each CPE you can still bond them in Linux.

 

[sfx2000]

Dual WAN - really depends on the stability of your primary service provider... if they're fairly solid, then I would say no, as going dual-wan adds complexity that might interfere with other services (do you run VPN client SW out to the internet, something to consider...)

I've got two ISP accounts

1) CoxHSI - traditional Cable ISP - DHCP from them on IPv4 and IPv6, IPv4 is public - by default I get a /64 on IPv6, and most ports are unfiltered, which is a must for me, as I do run a couple of telemetry servers at home for my dev units in the field that phone home
2) TMobile Home Internet - 5G Fixed Wireless - IPv4 is locally NAT'ed (192.168.86.0/24) and IPv6 doesn't offer PD to downstream -- so it's useless for routing... and all inbound ports on IPv6 are filtered.

So for me - dual WAN doesn't work, except as active/standby, with 5G-FWA as the connection of last resort...