Two ISP's

[Hermes14]

Greetings,

Current router: ASUS RT-AC66R
Firmware: 380.57 - Asuswrt-Merlin
Motherboard (Ethernet): Intel® Xeon® E3-1245v5
Knowledge level of OP: newbie/novice

The current ISP has too many outages (sometimes only a few seconds or minutes) which dran productivity. So I am getting a backup ISP and have some questions:

1) Are there any routers that have input for two ISP's? The Asus (with Merlin) has a good Traffic Monitor, and I want to be able to monitor usage for both ISP's in the home.

2) The workstation has one Ethernet entry but no wireless network card: Assuming a positive answer to 1) a solution to 1), is there a way to switch from one ISP to the other from the workstation.

3) If it turns out that I need to have two routers as well as a wireless network card for the workstation (so one ISP1 is wired and ISP2 is wireless or vice versa): How do I configure things so that

i) ISP1 takes precedence over ISP2
ii) If ISP1 "ping timeouts", then ISP2 takes over
iii) When ISP1 works again, then let it take precedence again.

In sum, I am looking for the most efficient way to manage two ISP's for the home with minimum hassle. Thank you in advance for your insights!

 

[coxhaus]

Are you sure it is your ISP having an issue?

 

[CrystalLattice]

Greetings,

Current router: ASUS RT-AC66R
Firmware: 380.57 - Asuswrt-Merlin
Motherboard (Ethernet): Intel® Xeon® E3-1245v5
Knowledge level of OP: newbie/novice

The current ISP has too many outages (sometimes only a few seconds or minutes) which dran productivity. So I am getting a backup ISP and have some questions:

1) Are there any routers that have input for two ISP's? The Asus (with Merlin) has a good Traffic Monitor, and I want to be able to monitor usage for both ISP's in the home.

2) The workstation has one Ethernet entry but no wireless network card: Assuming a positive answer to 1) a solution to 1), is there a way to switch from one ISP to the other from the workstation.

3) If it turns out that I need to have two routers as well as a wireless network card for the workstation (so one ISP1 is wired and ISP2 is wireless or vice versa): How do I configure things so that

i) ISP1 takes precedence over ISP2
ii) If ISP1 "ping timeouts", then ISP2 takes over
iii) When ISP1 works again, then let it take precedence again.

In sum, I am looking for the most efficient way to manage two ISP's for the home with minimum hassle. Thank you in advance for your insights!

No problem, they're available: https://www.linksys.com/us/p/P-LRT224/

 

[Hermes14]

Are you sure it is your ISP having an issue?

Absolutely. ISP1 (current) is a rural repeater system that distributes a single pipe of bandwidth over many customers; have had this issue of occasional, very short intermittent outages for ages, and it's gotten worse since more and more people upfeed are doing ever-increasing amounts of media streaming. Have discussed it with the owner many times..

 

[System Error Message]

asus routers support multi WAN over both WAN, LAN and USB. They arent really great at it though, but other than tp link, asus and the NAS brands i dont see other brands doing this well in the consumer space.

 

[coxhaus]

The Cisco RV340 router will handle 2 ISPs. It also has graphs. There is a review on this site for the RV345 router which is one of 3 versions of the RV340. Check it out and see if it does what you need. You will need to add your own wireless.

I have the older Cisco RV320 router. It has load balancing between WAN connections and a few other features. I would assume all this is in the newer RV340 router.

https://www.snbforums.com/threads/cisco-rv-345p-dual-wan-gigabit-poe-vpn-router-reviewed.41846/

Sorry, here is the review.
https://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lan...345p-dual-wan-gigabit-poe-vpn-router-reviewed

I had to reread the review since I plan to buy 1 in the future.

I found this for you.
The RV345P is a Dual WAN router, with two additional USB ports for connecting a 3G/4G modem to connect to WWAN services for additional WAN redundancy. The default config on the RV345P is for WAN1 to be the priority, WAN2 to be second priority, USB1 third, and USB2 as fourth as shown below.

 

[System Error Message]

The Cisco RV340 router will handle 2 ISPs. It also has graphs. There is a review on this site for the RV345 router which is one of 3 versions of the RV340. Check it out and see if it does what you need. You will need to add your own wireless.

I have the older Cisco RV320 router. It has load balancing between WAN connections and a few other features. I would assume all this is in the newer RV340 router.

https://www.snbforums.com/threads/cisco-rv-345p-dual-wan-gigabit-poe-vpn-router-reviewed.41846/

Sorry, here is the review.
https://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lan...345p-dual-wan-gigabit-poe-vpn-router-reviewed

I had to reread the review since I plan to buy 1 in the future.

I found this for you.
The RV345P is a Dual WAN router, with two additional USB ports for connecting a 3G/4G modem to connect to WWAN services for additional WAN redundancy. The default config on the RV345P is for WAN1 to be the priority, WAN2 to be second priority, USB1 third, and USB2 as fourth as shown below.

how much do these cisco RVs cost?

What he wants can be done easily already in the asus router he has. For instance, all you do is select failover in asus with a WAN 1 check. Theres no need to buy any new router, theres no need to have 2 routers, just 1 router that automatically sends traffic to whichever ISP happens to be up.

 

[coxhaus]

how much do these cisco RVs cost?

What he wants can be done easily already in the asus router he has. For instance, all you do is select failover in asus with a WAN 1 check. Theres no need to buy any new router, theres no need to have 2 routers, just 1 router that automatically sends traffic to whichever ISP happens to be up.

I don't own a Asus router. I never have.

Since you know so much about Asus routers why didn't you know about iptables on a Asus router on an old thread?

 

[yk101]

I used my ASUS-Merlin router with dual ISP in the failover mode for over 2 years. No issues whatsoever. Give it a try before resorting to more drastic measures.


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[avtella]

Synology RT2600AC supports Dual WAN as well.

 

[coxhaus]

I used my ASUS-Merlin router with dual ISP in the failover mode for over 2 years. No issues whatsoever. Give it a try before resorting to more drastic measures.
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When it fails over will it go back automatically?

 

[yk101]

I believe you can set that up as one of the options.


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[Hermes14]

I used my ASUS-Merlin router with dual ISP in the failover mode for over 2 years. No issues whatsoever. Give it a try before resorting to more drastic measures.

Many thanks to everyone for your replies. It is not clear how the Asus RT-AC66R can be used for dual ISP. See the picture below:

https://dlcdnimgs.asus.com/websites/global/products/LzShv8ma7TrQB4eO/backio.jpg

Used here:
https://www.asus.com/us/Networking/RTAC66R/

There is only one Ethernet entry. How do I plug in two ISP cables?

What is failover mode? How does one set it? Thank you in advance for any clarification/instructions.

 

[yk101]

Install Merlin’s firmware. On WAN tab enable dual wan configuration and select port to be used for connection from a drop down. You will need to reboot the router for this change to become effective.


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[coxhaus]

I think he still needs to know if after failover it will automatically go back to WAN 1. He wants WAN 1 to be primary. Anybody know if the Asus will do this?

 

[System Error Message]

I don't own a Asus router. I never have.

Since you know so much about Asus routers why didn't you know about iptables on a Asus router on an old thread?

IPTables isnt related to this as it is in the GUI bit of the config in WAN under dual WAN.

I think he still needs to know if after failover it will automatically go back to WAN 1. He wants WAN 1 to be primary. Anybody know if the Asus will do this?

Definitely, you can select fail over with primary WAN monitoring for it to switch back automatically.

 

[Hermes14]

Install Merlin’s firmware. On WAN tab enable dual wan configuration and select port to be used for connection from a drop down. You will need to reboot the router for this change to become effective.

Merlin is already installed, probably needs an update (currently at 380.57).

But are you saying that one of the four output Ethernet plugs (LAN 1-4) can be configured for input? Because there is only one Ethernet input on the left of the antennas per the picture:

https://dlcdnimgs.asus.com/websites/global/products/LzShv8ma7TrQB4eO/backio.jpg

 

[ColinTaylor]

 

[yk101]

Merlin is already installed, probably needs an update (currently at 380.57).

But are you saying that one of the four output Ethernet plugs (LAN 1-4) can be configured for input? Because there is only one Ethernet input on the left of the antennas per the picture:

https://dlcdnimgs.asus.com/websites/global/products/LzShv8ma7TrQB4eO/backio.jpg

I guess Colin’s picture worth 1000 words! [emoji16]



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[Hermes14]

Many thanks to everyone. Will return to this thread if any issues arise.