I’m working on a project where a client has two branches, Plant1 and Plant2, with subnets 10.0.0.0/24 and 10.0.1.0/24 respectively. Due to power issues, some servers from Plant2 were physically relocated to Plant1 but retained their original 10.0.1.0/24 subnet due to database requirements.
We’ve set up two Layer 2 links between Plant1 and Plant2: a primary L2L link via fiber optic and a backup PTP link, both outside of Peplink. Both plants have Peplink balancers, and there are additional branches connected via IPsec VPNs. I’m seeking advice on whether it’s possible to manage these two links with a Peplink balancer to ensure automatic failover without manual intervention.
If you have two L2 links between to locations you have to manage the loop you will create when they are both plugged in.
Usual approach for this is Spanning Tree protocol, (or Rapid STP preferably). You can find that on managed switches. You you could have both p2p bridges plugged into a switch at either end and then have a single ethernet to a lan port on each B580. Benefit then is you can set the fiber link as higher priority.
The other approach is to use LACP link aggregation and just plug the bridges into both B580s. Although your latency will be very different across the links and you can’t prioritize the fiber over the p2p link under LACP.
The final approach is to plug the two links into WAN ports on either side and use L2 Speedfusion Bonding. This would work great but the 200MBps VPN throughput limitation makes it less appealing.