Tech Question - Need Input About Dual Wan Routers

Me ^ | 6/9/2014 | The Louiswu

[The Louiswu]

I have a client that has 2 ISP's, Frontier and Mediacom and is running POS/Credit Card machines through the Frontier service primarily, however Frontier goes out from time to time so they would like to be able to switch to the Mediacom service easily and quickly during those down times. Question, is a dual wan router the best answer to this issue?

Thanks for the input.

[gura]

Like this one?

http://www.amazon.com/TP-LINK-TL-R470T-Broadband-Changeable-Ethernet/dp/B005SYQBN8

[taxcontrol]

I am a Cisco CCIE and have 20+ years of experience in the industry.

Your options are:
1) primary link with alternate technology backup (T1 with ISDN backup for example) Usually a single vendor solution

2) primary link with identical backup (T1 primary T1 secondary) Usually a two vendor solution

3) dual primary load balanced (T1 + T1) Usually a dual vendor solution

Matrix this by one or two routers. Due to cost, most small companies will go with a single router solution. If the attempt is to protect against the local router failure as well, a two router solution is required.

The short answer is Yes, a single router dual connected will provide fail over in the event of a single carrier outage. What it will NOT protect against is local loop failure or router failure.

I should caution that option #2 and #3 are increasing in complexity and will most likely require bringing in a VAR that has BGP load balancing experience as some of the configuration could get very complicated.

[cableguymn]

you want a network device with automatic fall over. Fortinet and others support this... The device will have WAN1 and WAN2 ports..

A cheap switch won’t be able to handle this.

Might be easier to just have two network cables at the device. if one goes down, plug the other in.

[SecondAmendment]

You want a firewall/router which supports WAN failover such as this one:

Linksys LRT224 Dual WAN Router.

[tophat9000]

Question: Because this is for a POS Credit Card system there may be more involved then just rolling to a new isp during an outage..(I do PCI...Payment Card Industry...compliant networks) you going to need to contact you pos vendor to get a handle on the data flows and security in place...Bottom line the point of the connection and your need for a stable link is for your Business POS..so start with your POS vendor first so your solution works with POS system requirements..they probably have address this types of issues in the past and might have a simpler solution for redundancy backup..plus addressing being pci compliant.

[Lee N. Field]

I have a client that has 2 ISP's, Frontier and Mediacom and is running POS/Credit Card machines through the Frontier service primarily, however Frontier goes out from time to time so they would like to be able to switch to the Mediacom service easily and quickly during those down times. Question, is a dual wan router the best answer to this issue?

Take a look at Mikrotik Routerboards. Here's where we get them.

Be warned -- they are not your typical home router. Much more complex to set up.

With our customer's, it's usually Mediacom that gives out, and sometimes in such a way as the router can't tell the connection is down (break is further down the line). I have a couple customer's with SonicWall NSA240s, with failover set up. It checks the connection by pinging some site at set times. Gets around this mediacom problem.

[johncatl]

A dual wan router that is POS/Credit compliant is what you need

here is a website that can help

http://dualwan.org/

http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/routers/rv082-dual-wan-vpn-router/index.html

[minnesota_bound]

Say “Dual Wan Routers” 3 times while eating fried rice.

[Citizen Zed]

How about using smart-phone swipers and a low cost cell service like Republic Wireless? For Example

[SandwicheGuy]

Good Grief! When you have only a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Install an additional network card, plug the second modem into that, download and install Connectify Dispatch, and you are in business, fall-over and all. AND your throughput is much higher. That’s it. Try keep up guys.