Multi WAN w/DSLs

thomas777

Hi

I have been running PFSense 2.0Beta since October of last year. Updating to different snapshots. For the most part it has been running smoothly.

I have 2 DSL's from Verizon setup as 2 separate WANs via PPPoE. They are configured as a load balancing group.

I decided to convert my DSL's to static IP DSL's from Verizon which they will install Thursday next week.
Today they sent me via email my new IP addresses including the gateway IPs. It turns out both WANs (via DSL's) will have the same Verizon gateway.

Will this be a problem if both my WANs have the same gateway IP address on the ISP side for PFSense load balancing and fail-over functionality to work correctly.

Longer Description - not necessary to read on….
I am doing this because using PPPoE has been problematic for me, it works but not perfectly, I have a never ending message that says gathering data on both WANs. They appear to work but not sure if working properly, with fail over and load balancing functioning properly. The only snapshot that this seemed to go away on was the October 18th snapshot - back in October of last year I spent a lot of time trying to fix this problem but since I used the October 18th snapshot, it went away. A month ago or so I upgraded snapshots to a new one as well as trying different ones this month and the gathering data message wont go away again, and I think the server routing is malfunctioning as a result. Unfortunately I never saved the old snapshot. This is the long reason for why I want to switch to static DSL's. With the idea it wont have this problem.

I gave the long description if it helps. But the question really is will two DSL's WANs using the same ISP gateway be a problem for PFSense load balancing and failover functionality.

I understand that one gateway on the ISP side does not give redundancy, but that is not a problem for me at this time.

Thanks
Thomas

cmb

Won't work if they're both the same gateway and you're doing the PPPoE for both on the firewall. Can do PPPoE for one on the modem and NAT there.

thomas777

Hi

I intend to turn both into static DSLs and in bridged mode on the DSL router. So the Wan interface on PFSense would be configured with the static public IP from Verizon. In this case they would both have the same ISP gateway IP. They are giving me 2 different IPs but using the same gateway.

To clarify, this would eliminate PPoE for both, I am using PPoE currently and I am trying to change that.

Would this work.

If not, would configuring the LAN side of my 2 DSL routers on different subnets work. Doing this would make PFSense think they are are completely different gateways. Even though the WAN on the DSL routers would be using the same ISP gateway IP.

So for example DSL router #1 IP address would be 192.168.1.1
DSL router #2 IP address would be 192.168.2.1

Would this work and be stable for load balancing on PFSense.

root2020

So for example DSL router #1 IP address would be 192.168.1.1
DSL router #2 IP address would be 192.168.2.1
That would work just assign the pfsense box 1 with 192.168.1.2
And box 2 192.168.2.2. That would mean the gateway for your pfsense boxes would be your router ip that is connected to pfsense.

Just don't use the default gateway as the line monitor IP. Use the actual default gateway of your ISP. The monitoring IP will let you know if your connection to your ISP drops or your connection gets lagg.

thomas777

Thanks for the info guys. I think I can work it out now.

Thanks

Darkk

Or you can monitor the ISP's DNS servers as it too will have a better idea of the network connection.

Either way will work just fine.