Fae wrote

Dear @TheBundu,

 

TheBundu wrote

I want to know, In TL-R470T+ or TL-R605, if one ISP/WAN becomes slow, will it account for that and route more traffic through the faster WAN(s)/ISP(s)?

 

No, it won't account for whether the WAN is slow or not. The Load Balancer router TL-R470T+ or TL-R605 doesn't select WAN based on speed but selects WAN based on sessions to make good use of all bandwidth.

Dear @Fae, 

Thanks for your reply. So, perhaps because I'm not 'a techie', I don't fully understand your answer. What's 'selecting WANs based on sessions'?

THe reason I am asking these questions is that I am trying to solve for the following: I have one 4G LTE based router (router 1) that seems to show down in the evenings even though that SIM still has high speed data quota, thereby making  Zoom calls difficult at that time. So I want to combine it with another 4G LTE based router (router 2) placed in a different location dozens of meters away, which I've tested does not slow down like this, using a TL-R605 in order to ensure that we can continue to work online with its help at such times. Will doing this solve my problem?

(By the way, in this scenario, I am not just completely switching to the other router 2 for the whole home only because it is not fast enough all the time on it's own, it's about 'medium speed', good enough for backup. Even though the router 1 does slow down in the evenings, when it is not slow, it is quite fast, or used to be! And I am not using the failover feature of TL-R605 because router 1 does not quite shutdown, it only becomes slow. Overall, just now, I want to use the combined bandwidths of both routers when multiple people are logged in together so that each person has less slowness, and the slowing of one of the WANs should interrupt their work less.)

@TheBundu 

Almost 85% of the internet traffic that originates from your computer/phones uses the TCP protocol.  (Web browsing, youtube, zoom etc).  TCP is a connection oriented protocol. ie) When you start browsing a website, a TCP connection is established and closed when the page is downloaded.  The connection start to end is called a TCP session.  The TCP sessions can be a short or of long duration.  For zoom calls, the session can be as long as your call duration.  ie) The TCP connection established at the start of the zoom call and the TCP connection ends when the zoom call ends.  (The TCP connection can break during the call, and a new session will be established when that occurs)

The TCP connection is established using one of the WAN links and the data must be transmitted using the same WAN link for that particular connection. (session). 

So to answer your question, the muti-WAN routers dont combine the traffic, but distribute the TCP connections (sessions) among the WAN interfaces, based on their load balancing algorithms. 

If the zoom calls are important, you can configure R605 to route the traffic from zoom call PCs through WAN 2 and rest of the devices through other WAN. (using the policy routing option)

Hope this helps. 

Landcruiser wrote

@TheBundu 

 

Almost 85% of the internet traffic that originates from your computer/phones uses the TCP protocol.  (Web browsing, youtube, zoom etc).  TCP is a connection oriented protocol. ie) When you start browsing a website, a TCP connection is established and closed when the page is downloaded.  The connection start to end is called a TCP session.  The TCP sessions can be a short or of long duration.  For zoom calls, the session can be as long as your call duration.  ie) The TCP connection established at the start of the zoom call and the TCP connection ends when the zoom call ends.  (The TCP connection can break during the call, and a new session will be established when that occurs)

 

The TCP connection is established using one of the WAN links and the data must be transmitted using the same WAN link for that particular connection. (session). 

 

So to answer your question, the muti-WAN routers dont combine the traffic, but distribute the TCP connections (sessions) among the WAN interfaces, based on their load balancing algorithms. 

 

 

If the zoom calls are important, you can configure R605 to route the traffic from zoom call PCs through WAN 2 and rest of the devices through other WAN. (using the policy routing option)

 

Hope this helps. 

 

Dear @Landcruiser ,

Thank you so much for explaining that to me so clearly. I really appreciate it. 

I do have just one follow up question though.

So, if the connection becomes too slow during a Zoom call, that platform calls it out, right? So, at that time, will it send another request, and if it does, will that automatically be routed through the faster WAN by TL-R605?

Similarly, if, say, I am trying to send a message on 'WhatsApp for Web', and it isn't showing that single tick yet, will the WhatsApp page attempt to send it again, thereby initiating a new request, which can then perhaps be automatically routed by the TL-R605 via the better WAN for it, especially if I set no particular policy for which WAN is to be used?

Or will it be such that in each of the above two scenarios, it will continue to try to route it via the original WAN initially picked for the first request, even if it is the slower one?

And, if the latter is the case, on the website of this product (https://www.tp-link.com/in/business-networking/omada-sdn-router/tl-r605/), when it says 'The multi-WAN Load Balancing function distributes data streams according to the bandwidth proportion of every WAN port to raise the utilization rate of multi-line broadband', what does that mean?

@TheBundu 

I have same question, what is the purpose of load balancing when one ISP become slower and not utilized the ISP with faster speed?

If anyone could explain in layman terms, it would be great.

Follow up question, how to merge the bandwidth of two ISPs? Thus adding the download and upload speed of the two ISPs using TL-R605.

@TheBundu 

The Multi-WAN routers work with the assumption that the WAN interfaces have constant (fixed) bandwidth.  The user has to configure the download and upload bandwidth (speed) of each interface, and the router uses it to balance the traffic between them. If you configure the download speed as 20 Mbps for WAN 1, and when you download a file, if the speed drops to 512 kbps, (due to heavy load on 4G or other factors) the router assumes that WAN 1 is less loaded (it doesnt think that the link has slowed down) and it will try to load the same interface with more connections. 

There is a option in the router "Application optimized load balancing". If you enable it, the router will try to use the same WAN interface for the same device as much as possible. ie) multiple connections from your PC will go through the same the WAN interface. 

If it is disabled, the router will aggressively route the connections on multiple WAN interfaces. 

The Zoom app doesnt know about the multi-WAN routers.  I presume, unless the connection breaks, it wont try to re-establish the  connection. 

@Landcruiser, thank you so much. This is clear. 

Looks like the load balancer is no use to me for my problem. Well, that's a bummer. 

It is quite strange that a drop in speed will be taken as lesser load on that WAN! That seems to be the opposite of what's happening, to my non-techie brain. 

Is that what TP Link mean on their site (https://www.tp-link.com/in/business-networking/omada-sdn-router/tl-r605/) when they say, 'The multi-WAN Load Balancing function distributes data streams according to the bandwidth proportion of every WAN port to raise the utilization rate of multi-line broadband'. If not, would you know what this means?

Landcruiser wrote

@TheBundu 

 

The Multi-WAN routers work with the assumption that the WAN interfaces have constant (fixed) bandwidth.  The user has to configure the download and upload bandwidth (speed) of each interface, and the router uses it to balance the traffic between them. If you configure the download speed as 20 Mbps for WAN 1, and when you download a file, if the speed drops to 512 kbps, (due to heavy load on 4G or other factors) the router assumes that WAN 1 is less loaded (it doesnt think that the link has slowed down) and it will try to load the same interface with more connections. 

 

There is a option in the router "Application optimized load balancing". If you enable it, the router will try to use the same WAN interface for the same device as much as possible. ie) multiple connections from your PC will go through the same the WAN interface. 

If it is disabled, the router will aggressively route the connections on multiple WAN interfaces. 

 

The Zoom app doesnt know about the multi-WAN routers.  I presume, unless the connection breaks, it wont try to re-establish the  connection. 

 

 

@Landcruiser I apolgise, but I understand what you are saying now. Thanks. I went through the interface of the ER605 to some extent, and I realise that what you were trying to teach me is that system doesn't automatically detect the speed of each WAN port at all, but it can be specified by the user. When the user does specify it, it will route traffic based on the ratio of the speeds of each WAN port. 

Thanks for taking the time to explain this to me.

EnzoConqueror wrote

 

 

Follow up question, how to merge the bandwidth of two ISPs? Thus adding the download and upload speed of the two ISPs using TL-R605.

@EnzoConqueror Hi. Even though I am not a techie as such, I think have figured out the answer to your question from searching for an answer to it in the past. In simple layman's English, merging two or more internet connections proper, so that it looks and acts like one, is called 'bonding', and this needs to be enabled by your ISP for it to work. So, from what I know, I guess if one wants faster speeds than the one provided by the fastest tariff of one's ISP, the technology exists to take two connections from the same ISP and merge them via the 'bonding' process, if the ISP allows it and supports that service.  

But, I don't know how that will work if I have two ISPs, one connection from each. So, that's that.