Dual internetwork connections

guna_pmk · 08-09-2012, 07:49 AM

Hello experts,

I need a networking advice from you.

I have bought two internet connections. One with unlimited download and high speed and the other one with a limited download and a fair speed.

The idea is to use the slower one as a backup connection used when the regular one goes off.

The desire is to automatically switch between the connections without affecting the LAN, if possible.

Where should I start from? What are the options?

Thanks

deadeyes · 08-09-2012, 08:33 AM

I would think both internet connections have a seperate interface(modem) on a server?

You could set the metrics different for both interfaces.
This way one interface will be used unless the one with the best metric goes down.

The LAN would never be affected as that is a seperate interface on the server and has a dedicated lan switch.

There was a small linux distro that did just this however I can't recall the name or how it actually does this.

guna_pmk · 08-09-2012, 11:04 AM

Quote:

I would think both internet connections have a seperate interface(modem) on a server?

Correct

Quote:

You could set the metrics different for both interfaces.
This way one interface will be used unless the one with the best metric goes down.

How should I configure this? Please let me know of any documentation for this.

Quote:

The LAN would never be affected as that is a seperate interface on the server and has a dedicated lan switch.

True

Quote:

There was a small linux distro that did just this

Will be a lot better instead of configuring something from scratch.

Thanks for your suggestion. Please let me know if you recall the distro name.

Thanks

deadeyes · 08-10-2012, 02:53 PM

You could use Shorewall.

This is a page dedicated to multi-internet connection setup:
http://www.shorewall.net/MultiISP.html

Note that distros like Shorewall provide a graphical interface however in the background they do what you could do with any other distro.

I would say google is your friend

guna_pmk · 08-13-2012, 04:35 AM

I will definitely give Shorewall a go. In the mean time, I also came across clearOS which does similar thing. Has anyone came across this and possibly has had good (or bad) experience with this?

Please share.

Thanks