How to make the most of a 1.15Gbps (Gig1) Virgin Media ISP

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carlpea

New Member
Oct 18, 2021
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I have been trying to get this to work with mictotik and udm Pro I am getting the speeds but after 6 hours drops on Rx to one connect but tx carries on balancing. Then once I reboot sh4 again it works again so frustrating.

Any help would be very helpful
Is your HUB on firmware 01.02.065.21.EURO.PC20 ?
 

samk1992

New Member
Dec 28, 2021
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Thought I'm gonna share my bonding results here using RB5009 connected to my PCs with 2.5Gbe network.


Can you guys go to the speedtest . net settings and switch to "Single" - what speeds now with the port bonding enabled?
Or try the one that comes up on google when you search speed test
 
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jamieandrew1

New Member
Jan 4, 2022
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UK
i am completely new to bonding with the virgin hub 4 i have the 1gbps package and would like to get the most out of it, can someone explain what i need to do and what accessories i will need on a budget to get this working?
 

samk1992

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Dec 28, 2021
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i am completely new to bonding with the virgin hub 4 i have the 1gbps package and would like to get the most out of it, can someone explain what i need to do and what accessories i will need on a budget to get this working?
In the simplest possible way: What you need is a router that supports balance-rr that has a single 2.5gbp or more network interface.
So, the two 1gbp ports will be bonded together connected to the modem and then the 2.5gbps port out to the rest of your network.

Im not convinced theres any way to do this 'on a budget' because its going to cost a minimum of a couple of a hundred quid.

An example setup could be:
(keep in mind this router doesnt do wifi so you'd also need some kind of wifi access point - I just use the Amazon eeros in bridge mode however they have 1gbps network ports which obviously holds back the wifi bandwidth in this setup):

A router that supports balance-rr:

A 10Gbit SFP (this goes into the router and gives it a 10gbps port)

For this particular router:

- connect your computer via ethernet to any port other than the first two (first is configured as the WAN port by default so thats the one that expects your modem - we also want to bond that with the second) then browse to 192.168.88.1 (routers default IP)

- put that SFP into the SFP port on the router
- go to System -> Users and change the admin password
- Go to Bridge -> Ports -> Click port two and select remove
- I cant remeber if the SFP port is in the LAN bridge by default but if not you'll also want to go to Bridge -> Ports again and click Add new, selecting the SFP port and that default bridge.
- Go to Interfaces -> Bonding -> Add a new bond and use ether1 and ether2
- Go to Interfaces -> Interface List -> select the WAN one and change it to the new WAN bond.
- make sure the virgin hub is in modem mode
- connect both ports 1 and 2 on the router to the 1 and 2 on the modem.

I think thats like the bare minimum setup.

Its worth noting on this router each group of 5 interfaces (i.e 1-5 and 6-10) have a limit of 2.5gbps so it would make sense to yourself a switch and connect it to the SFP port on the router so all the local traffic just goes through that (unless its going out to WAN).

some switch examples:


this one only has a couple of 2.5gbps ports but might suffice:

Sorry if this isn't very clear, Im not particularly good at writing these kind of things.
 
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bigsinky

New Member
Jan 7, 2022
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Ok I have ASUS ax 86u with a 2.5Gbe WAN. I can link agg 2 of the gig lans with the merlin firmware. I have a qnap switch with 2x10gbe and 4x2.5gbe ports. Do I

1. Connect 2 lan ports in my superhub4 to the link agg ports on my ASUs router.

2. use the 2.5gb wan port on the ASUS router to connect to a 10gbe port on my switch

3. use a 2.5gbe port on my switch to connect to the 2.5gbe nic on my pc.

am I missing something here? Is it that simple?
 

carlpea

New Member
Oct 18, 2021
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Ok I have ASUS ax 86u with a 2.5Gbe WAN. I can link agg 2 of the gig lans with the merlin firmware. I have a qnap switch with 2x10gbe and 4x2.5gbe ports. Do I

1. Connect 2 lan ports in my superhub4 to the link agg ports on my ASUs router.

2. use the 2.5gb wan port on the ASUS router to connect to a 10gbe port on my switch

3. use a 2.5gbe port on my switch to connect to the 2.5gbe nic on my pc.

am I missing something here? Is it that simple?
The HUBs do not support link aggregation (802.3ad), only other bonding methods not supported by the ASUS. That's why you need another bit of kit in between like the Mikrotik.
 

baileya88

New Member
Jan 10, 2022
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I am not sure how the SH4 is working behind the scenes because of the limited GUI from it.

What I have found is that you can bond in both regular mode and modem only mode and get the same results as above. However, at the moment modem only mode appears to revert to a single connection (for downloads anyway) after a period of time (24 hours?). I am not sure if the same applies in regular mode or not as haven't had chance to test if yet.

I don't know if the load balanced round robin approach is the same as LAGG Load Balance on pfsense or not.

How are you getting on with it?
Hey I’m hoping you may be able to help…

I have followed the posts on here and setup my SH4 in modem mode with 4 Ethernet connections to my Mikrotik router in bonded balance-rr mode. I have to have ARP enabled or I have no internet connection even though a dhcp IP does seem to get assigned.

I am having the problem where after a few hours the RX seems to fall to just 1 of the bonded links, TX seems to stay across all 4. Ive checked and my SH is running f/w 01.02.065.21.EURO.PC20. Do you have any ideas what it could be?

Cheers
Aaron
 

carlpea

New Member
Oct 18, 2021
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Hey I’m hoping you may be able to help…

I have followed the posts on here and setup my SH4 in modem mode with 4 Ethernet connections to my Mikrotik router in bonded balance-rr mode. I have to have ARP enabled or I have no internet connection even though a dhcp IP does seem to get assigned.

I am having the problem where after a few hours the RX seems to fall to just 1 of the bonded links, TX seems to stay across all 4. Ive checked and my SH is running f/w 01.02.065.21.EURO.PC20. Do you have any ideas what it could be?

Cheers
Aaron
Does this behaviour actually cause an issue?

I've noted that upload is always shared equally across the links, however download can sometimes saturate one bonded link before making use of the other, or it's not shared equally at least (I only use two links in the bond):

1641940885400.png

Or are you saying one, or more, links are never used?
 

baileya88

New Member
Jan 10, 2022
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Does this behaviour actually cause an issue?

I've noted that upload is always shared equally across the links, however download can sometimes saturate one bonded link before making use of the other, or it's not shared equally at least (I only use two links in the bond):

View attachment 21097

Or are you saying one, or more, links are never used?
It seems to use the 4 links for Rx, not shared the same as yours - however it seems to stop after a few hours and only 1 link is used for Rx with just a few kbps on the other 3 links. Stays like this until I reboot the SH
 

carlpea

New Member
Oct 18, 2021
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It seems to use the 4 links for Rx, not shared the same as yours - however it seems to stop after a few hours and only 1 link is used for Rx with just a few kbps on the other 3 links. Stays like this until I reboot the SH
Could you confirm how you have your bridge setup? Are you using aggregation on the other side to a router, or the SFP port like mine?
 

baileya88

New Member
Jan 10, 2022
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Could you confirm how you have your bridge setup? Are you using aggregation on the other side to a router, or the SFP port like mine?
Yeah sure, I have the Mikrotik RB4011iGS+RM plugged into a 10gb switch via the SPF+ port on the mikrotik. Then use Eth1 - Eth4 which are all members of the bond balance rr to the VM Hub.
 

carlpea

New Member
Oct 18, 2021
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Yeah sure, I have the Mikrotik RB4011iGS+RM plugged into a 10gb switch via the SPF+ port on the mikrotik. Then use Eth1 - Eth4 which are all members of the bond balance rr to the VM Hub.
Every time I either reboot the HUB or the Mikrotik I get link drops for at least 4 hours before it settles. I believe this is some kind of 'Bedding In' process the HUB does when sharing across ethernet ports in modem mode.

I'm unsure if you see this behaviour, however I would suggest you turn off the HUB, remove two of the four ethernet cables, then power the HUB back on and monitor.

I'm pretty sure I experienced a similar issue when experimenting with more than two connections to the HUB. It was a while ago though!
 

baileya88

New Member
Jan 10, 2022
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Every time I either reboot the HUB or the Mikrotik I get link drops for at least 4 hours before it settles. I believe this is some kind of 'Bedding In' process the HUB does when sharing across ethernet ports in modem mode.

I'm unsure if you see this behaviour, however I would suggest you turn off the HUB, remove two of the four ethernet cables, then power the HUB back on and monitor.

I'm pretty sure I experienced a similar issue when experimenting with more than two connections to the HUB. It was a while ago though!
Hey, I gave 2 connections a go and the same thing happened annoyingly! Will keep on trying to figure out what’s going on though.
Thanks for your help.
 

carlpea

New Member
Oct 18, 2021
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Hey, I gave 2 connections a go and the same thing happened annoyingly! Will keep on trying to figure out what’s going on though.
Thanks for your help.
Rubbish!

Well have a review of my settings below just in case:

SFP
1642013726200.png1642013861800.png

Links (Both setup the same OTHER THAN loop protection disabled on one of them)

1642013760900.png

WAN Bond (forced manual MAC Address to ensure doesn't conflict)

1642014068600.png1642014106700.png


MAIN Bridge

1642014150400.png
 

Attachments

baileya88

New Member
Jan 10, 2022
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Rubbish!

Well have a review of my settings below just in case:

SFP
View attachment 21125View attachment 21128

Links (Both setup the same OTHER THAN loop protection disabled on one of them)

View attachment 21126

WAN Bond (forced manual MAC Address to ensure doesn't conflict)

View attachment 21129View attachment 21130


MAIN Bridge

View attachment 21131
Thanks for this - My setup is pretty much identical, Ive just updated the loop prevention so will see if that has any change. Cheers
 

rickyb90

New Member
Dec 11, 2021
9
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Thought I'm gonna share my bonding results here using RB5009 connected to my PCs with 2.5Gbe network.

Hi,
As you're the first post on here I can see with a RB5009 would you kindly share your config with me.

I've gone through a few different setup posted on here and they don't seem to work properly on my RB5009, perhaps because of the different number and internally configured ethernet ports.

My current router has my Synology DS918+ connected link aggregation 802.3ad so I need to set that up on the Mikrotik too.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Richard
 

Vertigo1

New Member
Nov 13, 2021
5
1
3
FWIW, after an earlier snafu on my part (which I posted about here but deleted when I realised my mistake), I've got this working with pfSense now.

Having proven the concept, I've reverted back to my old set up for the time being as I'm waiting for a VM engineer on Tuesday to relocate the cable ingress point. Currently the modem and router are in different locations and I only have a single Ethernet cable between them so need to reloate the modem too before I can put the aggregated link in permanently.