I have been searching for a solution that solves the problem of manually re-connecting to a backup isp when my primary goes down. I have read the threads about the nexland product and wonder how the new hawking product compares in performance. It is much cheaper (<$100 street). It looks like it uses the 1st wan connect as a primary and auto activates the 2nd wan when the 1st disconnects or overloads (no load balancing). Anyone try this product yet?
can you post a link? Also, in reading about the Nexland router, more than one user has complained that the 'failover' doesn't work as advertised at all times. I don't know if it's because they're trying some exotic settings or not...
Unfortunately this product is so new there's no link on hawking's page yet. I called them and got a spec sheet (pdf), which was too large to attach to the original post. Their number is 888-662-8828, you can request them to email you a spec sheet. I'm interested in trying it even without a review since it's so cheap.
Once you start paying over $100/month your options start to expand beyond normal retail services. In my area if you have both DSL and cable modem you are getting up to that cost level. Time Warner has the Roadrunner Business Class of cable modem service for about $90/month which will give you a fixed IP address and an uptime guarantee and priority customer service. Your local phone company may provide entry level Frame Relay connections for $100/month, but those deals vary by location and company.
I have both cable & dsl at around $90. In a prior location, I had "guaranteed" uptime, but when it went down, all it was good for was a prorata discount of my fees (approx $3/day). I'm comfortable with using cable as primary & dsl as backup and switching manually when cable goes down, but would like an automatic solution.
I'm trying to get a bead on this too...I posted alot in that other thread. As far as the failover on the nexlands, the one complaint I heard with any level of detail involved DNS caching problems. It's not particularly exotic, but it might be extremely easy to get around, or simply fix by doing a 2-second reboot on the router to get it to refresh the DNS settings. So this hawking thing is just failover? No load balancing? Is the second "WAN" truly broadband, or is it analog modem? There are alot of inexpensive routers that have a WAN connection with failover to analog modem. The nexland provides this as a third backup.
I played with that thing (Pro800turbo) for over 2 months with the help of support. Finally, the guy said send it back for a refund. The folks at nexland are very nice and were good to work with. Too bad their product didn't work for me. My $.02009 (decimalization). Rich
I knew someone here would have experience with it! What was the problem exactly? Poor performance or just flat out didn't work? Was it the failover or what?
If you are looking for purely a back-up, then I think the best soultion is to have 2 totally different services with differnet backbones - like a cable and DSL - and then use either the Compex routers (need 2 @ about $70 each) or the MidPoint software. The Nextland seem to have lot of problem doing the autofail switchover when one service crashes. Im still doing some research..Just trying to make sure I have money back guarantee on everything I get!