Connect Multiple LANS and Do file sharing

TahaKazi · Jan 30, 2014

HI,

I have an office that has 4 separate internet connections of 10Mbps each coz we dont have anything more than that and lease lines are way too expensive. Now trouble is i have around 55 PCs split over the 4 internet connections. I want all data that people have to be stored centrally and create a network that can do intercommunication, Is there any way where i can bridge these 4 individual LAN's and possibly share a network drive over all the 55 PC's.

Thanks

getochkn · Jan 30, 2014

you need a load balancing router that will take all 4 net connections and then balance the load on which connection gets used as needed. Then it still acts as a router to give out IP's, DHCP, etc and would keep all your clients on the same network while allowing 4 net connections to be used.

http://www.tp-link.com/en/products/details/?categoryid=227&model=TL-R480T%2b

Companies use these for the situation listed as yours, or for things like a backup connection. Your main ISP goes down ,the 2nd connection kicks in.

You could also take an old PC, get 5 network cards, put them in, run something pfsense and make your router but that requires a lot of linux work, find a pc with 5 pci or pci-e slots, etc.

TahaKazi · Jan 30, 2014

Thanks for the quick reply. I like your first idea. What i want to know is will this router use only one internet connection at a time or will it use all 4.

getochkn · Jan 30, 2014

I would assume each router has different abilities to handle the multiple connections. I just googled the first one I found, there are many out there so don't take that one as the best, it was just an example. This is from the specs on that model though.

+ Supporting multiple Load Balance modes, including Bandwidth Based Balance Routing,
Application Optimized Routing, and Policy Routing to optimize bandwidth usage.

+ Featured Link Backup to switch all the new sessions from dropped line automatically to another
for keeping an always on-line network

I would take it as bandwidth balanced is when your up or down stream is maxed on line 1, it switches to line 2, etc. Application based would be all skype goes to line 1, web to line 2, ftp to line 3, etc. Policy is setting certain rules either by IP, time of day, etc, etc.

TahaKazi · Jan 30, 2014

Sorry to act dumb.. But some things went right over my head. I'm a newbie to networking. So basically if line 1 is maxed then line 2 would be used along with 1... And if both are maxed then the third with the first 2. I hope that makes sense. If this is what it does then i guess i can use it in the office

getochkn · Jan 30, 2014

you can set them a million different ways. if it's maxed, if it hits 50%, I've seen ones that basically just route it to the first, then the 2nd, the 3rd, etc for each connection. they are many different ways and routers that can do it, but I'm a bit dumb too, I just know you need some kind of load-balancing router than handles 4 connections. lol.

bill001g · Jan 30, 2014

I agree a multi wan router is going to be the simplest.

You can if you want to do it for free in exchange for a little more work. You can set the routers to say 192.168.1.1, 192.168.1.2 ...etc. Then manually set the IP addresses on the PC setting the default gateway on each to the proper router. YOU in effect become the load balancer. 55 machine might be manageable you start talking 500 and then there is no way you will be doing it all day.

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Connect Multiple LANS and Do file sharing

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