I'm currently reading about bonding two interfaces with linux but, I would like to know if I can add up the speed. For example if I have two 5Mb dsl lines and bond both using the bonding kernel feature would I get 10Mb when a speed test is ran?

I have a dual balance setup with these two lines and everytime I run a speed test I get 5Mb.

Thanks in advanced.

Hi,

To my knowledge bonding gives you the possibility to have a hot standby or load balancing. Speed is not increased (it is actually decreased a little bit by the overhead, but that is hardly noticeable).

If set up correctly (2 physical network cards, not 2 interfaces on the same physical card) it will provide some fault tolerance (either network card can fail, the bonding makes sure the other card is used and you get time to replace the faulty card without down time).

I'm not sure how to implement your wish (2 cards -> double the network speed), I'm not even sure if that is possible.

Hope this helps.

I thought I read that somewhere (I guess I dreamed about it then).

So there isn't a way to two or three lines and add them up?

Here's something about it:

http://www.linuxplanet.com/linuxplan...orials/6414/1/

Well you can get extra throughput with bonding directly if you pick the right mode, but that's only on a layer 2 implementation. For DSL LB and the likes, look up good old lartc.org chapter 4 all the way. The link above will be of no use if you are using different network routes on each link.

You'll be very unlikely to ever see a change in a speed test result, as that is going to usually be only one tcp connection to pull some data, which will always take a single route. Your use of both links come in when probability and the likes spreads multiple links to multiple destinations outbound over the two connections.

For a layer-2 bond (to double your bandwidth) you would need 'control' at both ends of the connection. Your best bet is to call your ISP and see what they could offer you (if they offer anything) as to bond two channels into one faster channel, something needs to be done/programmed into the switching/routing equipment at the ISP level.

I have done this with my ISP - something had to be done at the ISP itself for it to work properly.

I don't know what to do. Like I mentioned before, I already have a load balance with tc working ok but, noticed that the live messenger drops connections maybe is because it sends a packet one direction and the other direction or through the other route. Also, I cant login from neither dsl lines via ssh. I don't know why. But, I'm trying to get all these issues resolved but, don't know which direction to go here.

Any ideas?