Dual ISPs
Dual ISPs
Hey everyone, I’m tired of the frequent outages with my AT&T Fiber connection and the outdated gear they provide. That’s why I switched to Verizon 5G Home Plus. Here’s what I have now:
- My home uses AT&T Fiber at 1Gbps, connected through a 16-port switch that feeds each room
- Verizon 5G offers 300Mbps on its own, with better signal from nearby devices than the AT&T router
- AT&T often experiences short interruptions lasting minutes or even days, so I usually just wait and hope things improve
- Verizon’s service has been more stable in my past experience, relying on cell towers rather than fixed lines
- My goal is to have everything—LAN and WiFi—connected to a single network that includes both providers
- Ideally, I’d like the system to automatically switch to Verizon when AT&T goes down
- Do I need a dual WAN port router? And should I connect a WAP into the new router for one WiFi network?
I’m still learning how to set this up, but I want to make the most of both connections while keeping downtime to a minimum.
Absolutely feasible, and you'll require a router with compatible features. https://www.draytek.com/support/knowledge-base/5734 (This is the failover setup where it switches to an alternate internet connection if the primary fails)
Great choice! The TP Link router with WAN failover is designed for simplicity. After setup, it automatically switches between the two WAN connections when one becomes unavailable. It doesn’t require heavy manual configuration beyond basic settings like the SSID and security options. The throughput typically combines both connections for a higher speed, usually around 1.3Gbps. You can disable the local WiFi broadcasts on all routers, and it will still connect to the shared ISP network under one unified SSID.
TP Link appears to offer a more intuitive interface compared to the Ubiquiti Edgerouter-X. Checking reviews or documentation for your model will reveal additional details about its settings and capabilities. If configured for load balancing without failover, it can allocate distinct connections across WANs. It probably doesn’t split a single TCP/IP link between WANs, nor does it formally link two WANs together. It likely sends pings to an IP you select or to the gateway address set by the WAN’s DHCP configuration. This is how it functions for my ER-X device. You can connect to each ISP gateway or modem through other methods if needed. I keep the 5 GHz band active on all my devices and reduce or disable 2.4 GHz, since I have no neighbors and want to limit interference with my main network name. Your choice.
Ah, I was hoping it would be able to bond both ISPs together to make a 1.3Gbps throughput. But as long as the failover works then that's all I need it to do. 1Gbps over the fiber connection is plenty fast. And this one has WiFi 6E which should yield higher speeds than the crappy AT&T BGW-210 gateway so I will probably see some improvements over wireless at least. If needed I can just connect to LAN at one of the routers that I need to access. Otherwise I don't think I will need to touch them at all. Thanks for the advice, hopefully it works well. Currently waiting on the router to arrive with Amazon.