Can I have two ISP,S in my home at the same time ?

[marcusmarsh]

My TOT line can be slow at times and devilishly slow when I use my proxy server.

Could I in theory get, say for example, a different ISP in the house, a 2nd one, obviously paying the two bills, and then if one is slow just use the other in the hope thats quicker and vice versa ?

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

yes... why not.

But if it's DSL, you might need or want two separate phone lines, one for each. I'm not sure whether you could run two different DSL provider services over the same single fixed line.

And of course, you'd need to live in an area that is actually served by more than one ISP. They don't all provide service everywhere.

But in addition, there could be the option, again depending on where you live, of adding a cable internet service, such a True Online, or a fiber to the home service, in addition to your current TOT service.

Then you'd have two different internet feeds each with its own modem. And you could plug one or the other into your PC or router as desired.

I now use True Online cable internet as my main ISP. But there was a time in the past, when True Online's cable internet service where I lived was pretty inconsistent, that I also had a phone-line based DSL service as a backup. So when True's cable internet went out, as it did too often back then, I'd just switch over to the DSL, and remain connected.

Edited March 26, 2014 by TallGuyJohninBKK

[Tywais]

You can connect them using a load balancer or adsl bonding.

http://www.increasebroadbandspeed.co.uk/multiple-adsl-connections

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Channel_bonding

[MeowBundit]

You can, the only one thing you need load balancer router and skilled person who can set up it... I can recommend MIkrotik, because they available in TH, but really without network engineer you can't set up it... I think you can order set up service from Thaimikrotik distributor.

[JSixpack]

See tropo's configuration here: http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/658557-sophon-broadband-internet-in-pattaya/page-2#entry7534850

[steve187]

i have had tot for some years, this year it went down for days, with promises to get sorted soon, i gave up and ordered 3bb, to be installed, and they both turned up on the same day, so now there are 2 in the house, tot with landline and 3bb no landline, 2 seperate cables

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

I didn't read the OP's post as trying to find a way to COMBINE two different Internet connections in his home.

I read it as wanting to have a second service to use as an alternative when his TOT service is down or too slow.

That's a simple and easy proposition, compared to trying to combine two services via load balancing.

[Gregory Morozov]

I didn't read the OP's post as trying to find a way to COMBINE two different Internet connections in his home.

I read it as wanting to have a second service to use as an alternative when his TOT service is down or too slow.

That's a simple and easy proposition, compared to trying to combine two services via load balancing.

For a multi-homed router detecting when the connection is down is easy. Automatically detecting when the connection is slow is fairly complicated.

[JSixpack]

I didn't read the OP's post as trying to find a way to COMBINE two different Internet connections in his home.

I read it as wanting to have a second service to use as an alternative when his TOT service is down or too slow.

That's a simple and easy proposition, compared to trying to combine two services via load balancing.

True, but it'd just be a waste not to take full advantage of having two.

Not THAT difficult. Been some posts here about it w/ recommended routers. tropo found the easiest solution and he says it works.

[Pib]

If two different ISPs provide lines of some type (ADSL, fiber, or cable/DOCSIS) provide service to your area, then sure you could get service from two or more ISP providers...then figure out how you might be able to effectively and cheaply integrate those services for a better internet connection.

But the problem is in a lot of areas, especially for phone lines, is only "one" telecommunications provider may have sole phone line rights to an area which also ends basically providing them sole ADSL rights since ADSL service is provided over copper phone lines. Kinda like in my western Bangkok moobaan, the choices of phone line provider are TOT, TOT, or TOT. Now True also provides cable internet & TV service to my moobaan (and I have both of those services) on separate cable TV lines, but they can not provide phone service over those lines since TOT has sole phone rights to my moobaan and I think most of the area surrounding my moobaan. A lot will depend on which telecommunications have phone/internet rights in your area/for your building....a lot of little telecommunications kingdoms in Thailand...of course you can see the same little telecommunications kingdoms in many areas of other countries also, especially in rural areas.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

I didn't read the OP's post as trying to find a way to COMBINE two different Internet connections in his home.

I read it as wanting to have a second service to use as an alternative when his TOT service is down or too slow.

That's a simple and easy proposition, compared to trying to combine two services via load balancing.

True, but it'd just be a waste not to take full advantage of having two.

Not THAT difficult. Been some posts here about it w/ recommended routers. tropo found the easiest solution and he says it works.

When I had two separate ISPs coming into my home, I only ever used one at a time.

And the reason was, most of my bandwidth intensive activity was/is video streaming, and load balancing doesn't work in that use.

On the other hand, if I was someone who was downloading or torrenting, then the dual/concurrent ISPs provide an advantage.

[lomatopo]

We have a few customers with both AIS AirNET (point-to-point broadband wireless) and TOT/FTTx or 3BB DSL.

We tried a dual-WAN router, not so much for "load-balancing" which is much misunderstood, but rather for back-up/fall-back/redundancy, and because we had to get the AirNET first as this was the only server available in new housing developments a during the first few months; and later we added fixed-line broadband.

In the end the dual WAN router, multiple modems, multiple routers/WiFi APs was a bit too much to remotely manage, so now customers just have two different networks, both with a single modem/ethernet/WiFi, and they can connect to one or the other as they choose.

In some areas your options for fixed-line broadband are limited to a single provider, sometimes because of exclusive arrangements between property management and service providers, but we do have some customers who can get True DSL/DOCSIS and/or TOT and/or 3BB, all three if they wanted.

Lastly we do have one installation with three (3) separate True DSL lines (and four True Cable TV lines - we could also get DOCSIS in this location), but we have three separate ADSL modem/ethernet/WiFi devices and six (WiFi) virtual networks.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

As noted, it really depends on the residence location in question.

At my home in central BKK, I can get both True cable and DSL internet, but not True fiber. I can get 3BB fiber, but not 3BB DSL. Last time I checked, I couldn't get TOT fiber, but that may have changed since then. I have no idea about CAT On Net fiber in my area.

Trying to keep track of all that, and keep up with the various changes, is more than enough to give anyone a decent headache.

I'm pretty sure if I was living upcountry, however, I wouldn't likely have that range of choices for Internet service.

[Dork]

I used to use a dual-wan router at my office some years ago when ADSL was much less reliable than it is now but gave up with it for much the same reasons as lomatopo mentions. Also I found that the failover was more trouble than it was worth. Each wan connection has an (adjustable) assigned timeout value so that if there is no response on one connection it switches to the other. However since there can be many reasons that a response is not received in time it would often cause problems for users on the LAN while it unnecessarily swapped between wan ports.

Maybe I just didn't know how to configure it properly but in the end it was easier to just have a separate router set to the same LAN IP address on each ADSL line and tell the staff that if the internet went down swap the cable from one router to the other.

Nowadays at home I also have 2 ISP's but have each router set to a different LAN IP on the same subnet and use a small utility on most devices to allow quick gateway switching. There are many free utilities that can do that.