I currently have one 1 Gbit cable internet provider coming into our house into a cable modem that then connects to the latest Orbi Wifi 6e router has 2 mesh satellites connected. Works great as long as the internet is up 
I have a new fiber option in my neighborhood now, and am considering purchasing that as my primary internet provider and downgrading my current cable speed to a cheaper option and use it as a backup option in case the fiber is unavailable. Ideally bonding the two would be great but not a must-have.
I am thinking that one of the Peplink Balance products would be ideal here. Having each of the modems be the wan input into the Peplink Balance product that then can pass on traffic to my Orbi Wifi 6e Router. I’m thinking I need to switch the Orbi Wifi 6e router into AP mode for this to work.
I have spent all night googling this and my head is spinning lol - any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you!
Hi Franz,
in your case I would just got for Balance Two. You will get two Gigabit WAN ports and you can prioritise the WAN, so that once one goes down another becomes active. Or you can use both at the same time and do load balancing.
In case you would like to do SpeedFusion bonding, it would require additional license, but as I understand you do not need it in your case.
Thank you for your quick response - I will try out the Balance Two!
A Balance 20X with firmware 8.3 might be worth a look.
With the (free) Virtual WAN feature (Peplink | Pepwave - Forum) you get your two wired WANs, and as a bonus the option to use a cellular WAN as fallback.
Cheers,
Z
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B20X is also an option but there are couple things to have in mind:
- To have a second WAN, there will be a need to purchase a Virtual WAN license. With this license one of the WAN connections will need to be VLAN tagged. Not sure this will be possible to achieve without additional equipment.
- Performance wise Balance Two has a more powerful CPU compared to B20X.
- On the bright side Balance 20X comes with embedded Cellular modem (CAT-4 or CAT-6 or CAT-7 depending on SKU). So you could have a third WAN option if needed for a backup. Also, Balance 20X cost is lower.
A virtual WAN is not included so long as PrimeCare is maintained – as @zegor_mjol has suggested above?
Short version: A Balance 20X with FW 8.3.0 under PrimeCare has a free Virtual WAN feature allowing the unit to operate two independent wired WAN connections. The Virtual WAN (on one of the LAN ports runs at the same speed as the designated WAN.
A quick test setup:
A B20X with FW 8.3, on PrimeCare.
(No Virtual WAN license purchased.)
A B380 with FW 8.2.1.
A 1Gbps ISP router, in this case essentially being a L3 switch (the routing will all be local).
Configure the B20X with one Virtual WAN on LAN port 4, employing “Step 5 Alternative” of the instructions provided by @isanniam at Peplink | Pepwave - Forum
Connect the WAN and LAN4 ports of the B20X both to a 1Gbps ISP router.
Connect the WAN port of the B380 to the same ISP router.
Configure the B380 as a WAN analysis server.
Configure the B20X as a WAN analysis client,
The test:
Run each of the two WAN connections (the standard WAN and the Virtual WAN on port 4) on the B20X against the B380.
Results:
The WAN and the Virtual WAN run at the same speed when run individually (roughly 900 Mbps).
When run at the same time (together) the load is split fairly evenly among the two, with the aggregate staying at 900 Mbps.
Observations:
Setting up the virtual WAN configuration was a piece of cake (thanks to @isanniam). The VLAN tagging is not an issue (simply define the Virtual WAN port as an access port).
The Virtual WAN shows up as any other WAN and under whatever name you provided when you defined it. E.g., it is available for outbound policies.
Conclusion:
Oh, joy!
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A PS:
I ran the same tests against a fusionhub hosted by UpCloud (just to check a real-life internet setting), and got the same results - a steady 935 Mbps for each port, and an even split when run together.
Cheers,
Z
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Hi Rick,
seems like my mistake and @zegor_mjol is right about Virtual WAN license while on Prime care. Sorry for guys
Here is the link and below is a screenshot:
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