Need some advice on lanning my DSL with a neighbor.

[xSouLTakeRx]

A neighbor and I would like to know how we could bridge our 2 dsl connections in order to double our bandwidth, if it's at all possible.. We'll obviously use wireless equipment, but we don't exactly know what hardware to buy and/or how to set it up... Any help is greatly appreciated..

Thanks,
st

[YeOldeStonecat]

The only practical means I know of combining two WAN connections is Nexlands Pro800 Turbo router, it's a router that has two WAN ports.

http://www.nexland.com/turbo.cfm

But as you see you need both modems somewhat near this router. And you "load balance", not "double" your bandwidth. There really aren't any devices that will "shotgun your bandwidth to double it"....just when one WAN connection gets maxed out, the load shifts to the second one. Just traffic gets distributed more evenly.

Only way I can think of is to have your neighbor run his RJ-11 for his DSL to your house, next to yours. Then 2x DSL modems into the above device. Then wireless it back to his place.

But depending on what that distance is, his performance, because of the wireless now being his weak link, would probably suffer.

The better solution would be to up your DSL packages to a higher performance package.

[xSouLTakeRx]

Thanks for the reply, stonecat...

If I were to host an internet game though, would this double my upload, allowing me to host a larger game? Say, If I was hosting 8 people and my 256k upload was maxed, would it start sucking bandwidth from the other users dsl connection, thus combining them?

Thanks,
st

[YeOldeStonecat]

The way the Nexland router works (have one at the office), is when one of the WAN connections is maxed out (either up or down), the router shifts additional traffic to the other WAN connection.

Bandwidth isn't doubled....it's just evenly spread out.

In your question, yes it would start sucking bandwidth from the other connection if the 256 current was maxed.

BUT....

you have introduced the wireless in your formula....which will add latency. Just ads up to a tangled mess.

If you're into hosting games, look into

1) Changing ISP's....find a high quality ISP with minimal hops to the main gateway. Most DSL ISP's are better than the local phone companies DSL service...performance wise. I'm huge into online gaming, and I gladly pay 90/month for my DSL through my longtime preferred ISP...rather than the 39/month from the local phone company.

2) Get a higher DSL package....most ISP's offer several packages of DSL.

3) Good performance router.

4) Dedicated server for your games...not "run a server and play on the same rig enjoying my 0 ping"...but run a nice dedicated server with a good NIC and a rock stable, tweaked, leaned out OS.

[glc1]

Yeah, that Nexland is more for redundancy and load balancing than anything else. In order to effectively combine the two connections to act as one, you'd probably need a more significant hardware solution (probably Cisco). If you really want to host, get an SDSL connection or at least a higher end ADSL connection.