Dual WAN Overview
Overview
Dual WAN allows for an additional full-time connection (such as DSL or Cable) to be connected on an unused Ethernet port. Once connected your full WAN connectivity is balanced between both the primary WAN interface and the dual WAN interface.
Dual WAN is a feature of the Internet Failover Softpak; you must purchase, download and install this Softpak in order to utilize the Dual WAN capabilities of an InstaGate. Also Dual WAN is only available on the InstaGate 404, 604 and 806 models. Earlier InstaGate models will be able to utilize the Internet Failover portion of this Softpak but they will not have the Dual WAN capabilities.
Configuration
To enable the Dual WAN on your InstaGate click on Network -> Failover/Dual WAN in the web interface and select the radio button for Dual WAN. This will show the configuration options for this service:
Connection Type - Select Ethernet or PPPoE depending on what type of connection is set up on the Dual WAN port.
Connection Port - Select the port that will be connected to your Dual WAN connection.
DNS Server IP Address - Enter the ISP's DNS server address for your Dual WAN connection.
Obtain a Dynamic IP Address - If your ISP is providing your Dual WAN IP dynamically, select this radio button.
Assign a Static IP Address - If your ISP provided you with static IP information select this radio button and enter the necessary information.
Troubleshooting
The InstaGate will balance any Internet traffic across the WAN and Dual WAN connections. When a computer attempts a connection out to the Internet, the Dual WAN software will select which connection to utilize on a per-connection basis. That means Dual WAN will alternate between the WAN and Dual WAN connection, in a round-robin, for every new connection request.
It is important to note that once a session is created, either through the WAN or Dual WAN port, that entire session must complete over that connection. If for whatever reason the WAN or Dual WAN connection fails during that session, it will not automatically be moved to the available connection.
The Dual WAN software is optimized for normal usage and NOT for testing. Attempting to test the Dual WAN capabilities by unplugging one of the WAN connections from the back of the unit will give invalid results because it can take up to 5 minutes for the InstaGate to fail the session over to the other connection in that situation. However if an internet connection fails on the ISP's end, the InstaGate will acknowledge the outage much sooner.
