Sharing bandwidth across multiple internet connections?

Sharing bandwidth across multiple internet connections?

[Simon]

Hi,

I recently (yesterday) upgraded my home internet connection from BT ADSL
(512k/256k), to NTL Cable(1Mb/256k), for the extra speed. However,
for the next 30 days I seem to be the owner of two broadband connections in
my home.

I have a linux (2.4.19) box running as the gateway for my home
network, and it's doing masquerading over eth1, which is the connection to
the cable modem. ppp0 is the connection to the ADSL, but is no longer used. 
(The internal net hangs off eth0)

Is there a clever trick I can do, to allow my home net to use the available
bandwidth on both connections? It would be weird, as they would both have a
very different real-world IP... But is it in any way possible? Seems a shame 
to have this bandwidth knocking about unused.

Simon



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re: Sharing bandwidth across multiple internet connections?

[Alan Womack]

 >>  Seems a
 >>  shame 
 >>  to have this bandwidth knocking about unused.

Try a google search on shutgun internet access, a modem manufacturer a few years ago came out with a kit to use two dialup modems to get 106K access.  You might find something that way.  There basically has to be a layer someplace that reassembles the packets from two different sources.
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Re: Sharing bandwidth across multiple internet connections?

[jbradford]

> I recently (yesterday) upgraded my home internet connection from BT ADSL
> (512k/256k), to NTL Cable(1Mb/256k), for the extra speed. However,
> for the next 30 days I seem to be the owner of two broadband connections in
> my home.
> 
> I have a linux (2.4.19) box running as the gateway for my home
> network, and it's doing masquerading over eth1, which is the connection to
> the cable modem. ppp0 is the connection to the ADSL, but is no longer used. 
> (The internal net hangs off eth0)
> 
> Is there a clever trick I can do, to allow my home net to use the available
> bandwidth on both connections? It would be weird, as they would both have a
> very different real-world IP... But is it in any way possible? Seems a shame 
> to have this bandwidth knocking about unused.

Yes, you effetively just need to set up the routing on your gateway
box to use both interfaces.

As long as you load-balance your _outgoing_ packets, you'll
effectively load-balance your incoming ones as well, because other
machines will send back data to the I.P. that they get the request
from.  Therefore, you'll want to send out more data over the NTL Cable
service than the BT ADSL service, because you've got more downstream
bandwidth on the cable pipe.

Have a look at various Linux firewalling and masquerading HOWTOs, and
you should be able to work out the best way to set it up.

John.
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Re: Sharing bandwidth across multiple internet connections?

[jbradford]

>  >>  Seems a
>  >>  shame 
>  >>  to have this bandwidth knocking about unused.
> 
> Try a google search on shutgun internet access, a modem manufacturer
> a few years ago came out with a kit to use two dialup modems to get
> 106K access.  You might find something that way.  There basically
> has to be a layer someplace that reassembles the packets from two
> different sources.

Only if you want to bond two modems at a higher level than the TCP/IP
protocol.  I.E. use two modems to carry the traffic of one TCP/IP
link.

The alternative, is to have two completely separate connections, and
send out packets over them both fairly randomly.  These will get
answered, and sent back via whichever connection they came from.
Therefore sending data out randomly over two interfaces is a crude
form of load balancing.

In practice, it should work quite well.

John.
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Re: Sharing bandwidth across multiple internet connections?

[jbradford]

> 
> Simon wrote:
>  > Hi,
> 
> Hi,
> [...]
> 
>  > Is there a clever trick I can do, to allow my home net to use the 
> available
>  > bandwidth on both connections? It would be weird, as they would both 
> have a
>  > very different real-world IP... But is it in any way possible? Seems 
> a shame
>  > to have this bandwidth knocking about unused.
> 
> I'm in the same situation (I subscribed to a second provider) and I've
> google'd all afternoon about this issue. I think I found what I need and
> maybe this is what you need as well :
> 
> 4.2. Routing for multiple uplinks/providers
> A common configuration is the following, in which there are two
> providers that connect a local network (or even a single machine) to the
> big Internet.
> 
> http://www.lartc.org/howto/lartc.rpdb.multiple-links.html

Assuming that you want to use this bandwidth primarily for
downloading applications, as opposed to running servers, make sure
that you weight the connections based on the downstream bandwidth.

I mean, if you had a 512/256K ADSL line, and a 2048/256K ADSL line,
instead of weighting them equally, it's best to send more data out
over the 2048/256K line, because you'll get more replies _back_
through it.

John.
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Re: Sharing bandwidth across multiple internet connections?

[Simon]

On Thursday 17 October 2002 16:38, Dragos LUNGU wrote:
> 4.2. Routing for multiple uplinks/providers
> A common configuration is the following, in which there are two
> providers that connect a local network (or even a single machine) to the
> big Internet.
>
> http://www.lartc.org/howto/lartc.rpdb.multiple-links.html

Thanks! That's pretty much what I was looking for.

On Thursday 17 October 2002 15:57, jbradford@dial.pipex.com wrote:
> The alternative, is to have two completely separate connections, and
> send out packets over them both fairly randomly.  These will get
> answered, and sent back via whichever connection they came from.
> Therefore sending data out randomly over two interfaces is a crude
> form of load balancing.

I was thinking it would have to be done like this... I was thinking perhaps it 
would be possible to route to odd-numbered addresses on one interface, and 
even-numbered on the other. But the weighting idea looks better, now that I 
know it's possible. :)

On Thursday 17 October 2002 16:02, jbradford@dial.pipex.com wrote:
> Assuming that you want to use this bandwidth primarily for
> downloading applications, as opposed to running servers, make sure
> that you weight the connections based on the downstream bandwidth.

Well, I was thinking for both downloading, and running servers actually. But I 
was thinking that I could play with something at the DNS level so that the 
interface that was gotten hold of for clients making connections was fairly 
random. Again, that wouldn't be perfect, and not proper load balancing, but 
better than nothing.

Might be overkill for the short amount of time I'm going to have both 
connections for though. :)

Simon


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Re: Sharing bandwidth across multiple internet connections?

[Simon]

On Thursday 17 October 2002 15:21, Alan Womack wrote:
> There basically has to be a layer
> someplace that reassembles the packets from two different sources.

I had a look, but couldn't see any software that could do this. It would be a 
'neat' solution though, as it would enable file downloads at 1.5Mb/s, as 
opposed to the routing method. But I couldn't understand how this would work 
without something clever going on at the other end of the connection.

Otherwise I could end up playing a game of quake, and some of my packets would 
start coming from a different IP? I can't imagine a quake server liking that. 
(For example)

Simon



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Re: Sharing bandwidth across multiple internet connections?

[Dragos LUNGU]

Simon wrote:
 > Hi,

Hi,
[...]

 > Is there a clever trick I can do, to allow my home net to use the 
available
 > bandwidth on both connections? It would be weird, as they would both 
have a
 > very different real-world IP... But is it in any way possible? Seems 
a shame
 > to have this bandwidth knocking about unused.

I'm in the same situation (I subscribed to a second provider) and I've
google'd all afternoon about this issue. I think I found what I need and
maybe this is what you need as well :

4.2. Routing for multiple uplinks/providers
A common configuration is the following, in which there are two
providers that connect a local network (or even a single machine) to the
big Internet.

http://www.lartc.org/howto/lartc.rpdb.multiple-links.html


 > Simon

Hope it helps.
Dragos .


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Re: Sharing bandwidth across multiple internet connections?

[Simon]

On Thursday 17 October 2002 16:38, Dragos LUNGU wrote:
> http://www.lartc.org/howto/lartc.rpdb.multiple-links.html

Okay, I'm trying to implement this atm... But I'm slightly confused about one 
thing...

The document says:
>>>
Let us first set some symbolical names. Let $IF1 be the name of the first 
interface (if1 in the picture above) and $IF2 the name of the second 
interface. Then let $IP1 be the IP address associated with $IF1 and $IP2 the 
IP address associated with $IF2. Next, let $P1 be the IP address of the 
gateway at Provider 1, and $P2 the IP address of the gateway at provider 2. 
Finally, let $P1_NET be the IP network $P1 is in, and $P2_NET the IP network 
$P2 is in. 
<<<

How exactly do I determine $P1_NET and $P2_NET... I'm slightly confused about 
what they are supposed to be.

Thanks,
Simon



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