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Hi all,<br>
<br>
I've just finished configuring some equipment that I hope will solve
the problem. I want to share the solution, in case anyone else has
similar needs. My master router is too old and limited to do any
firmware upgrades on it. However, I found a neat solution which should
prioritize her upload traffic for me. It turns out lots of switches
have qos functions now. I found this one at Fry's:<br>
<br>
Western Digital My Net 8 port gigabit switch.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.wd.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=750">http://www.wd.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=750</a><br>
<br>
It has ports that are prioritized by port number. There are two high
priority, four medium, and two low. There is nothing to set up. Just
plug in your devices. I just put this next in line behind my master
router. I plug my wife's router into one of the high priority ports.
According to the instructions, the internet router attaches to one of
the low priority ports. My printer plugs into a low priority port. My
router and anything else plugs into the medium priority ports. Bingo.
I instantly have her upload traffic prioritized above anything else.
Pretty cool for what I'm trying to do. My wife is still attached to
the NetGear wifi router that I was originally on. Hopefully, that
won't have any overheating or stability problems.<br>
<br>
Next, I wanted to make sure my PC equipment wasn't hogging the download
bandwidth. I got the ASUS RT-N16 gigabit wifi N 300 router, which I
will have all my equipment log into. If you get this router, you HAVE
to upgrade or replace the default firmware. The original firmware is
terribly slow, to the point of being almost unusable. I upgraded to
ASUS's latest, which I think they call AsusWRT. I don't know if it's
in any way related to DD-WRT or not. In any case, it has features
which can be used to control both upload and download bandwidth. This
is the first off the shelf router I've found which has downstream
bandwidth control. I ignored the upload settings, since my switch will
handle that. Here's how I set it up to limit the download bandwidth of
everything coming through my router. Doing this makes sure that her
system will have a few Mbps of download bandwidth no matter what I'm
doing.<br>
<br>
I go to the qos screen of the router admin system. On the automatic
mode page, I turn qos on and tell the system that I have 6 Mbps of
upload and 20 Mbps of download bandwidth. I then go to the user
defined priority page. I ignore the upload bandwidth settings. On the
download bandwidth settings, I set all packet priorities to use no more
than 68% of my available download bandwidth. This leaves at least 32%
of my download bandwidth for my wife's use, no matter what my stuff is
doing.<br>
<br>
I then go to the user defined qos rules page. I delete the rules that
they have there. I create a new rule to apply to all traffic as
follows:<br>
<br>
Name: All Traffic<br>
Source IP / MAC: blank<br>
Destination Port: 1:65535<br>
Protocol: any<br>
Transferred: 0~ (If used, this field allows certain rules to kick in
only when a certain amount of data is transferred.)<br>
Priority: Medium<br>
<br>
This sets every packet going through my router to Medium priority.
Based on the priority rules set on the other screen, all these packets
can use up to 100% of my upstream bandwidth. However, the prioritizing
switch won't let that happen. For upstream data, my wife's packets
will always take priority. These rules will not let my downstream
packets take up any more than 68% of my downstream bandwidth.<br>
<br>
For times when she's not working here. I have a second router attached
to the switch for myself which has no bandwidth restrictions. I can
use that when I want to do large downloads, etc. All my equipment will
be set to automatically log into the bandwidth restricted router unless
I manually do otherwise.<br>
<br>
Hopefully, all these things will keep her system humming along quickly
and her employer happy. They wouldn't like too much downtime.<br>
<br>
Thanks to all who responded for their suggestions.<br>
<br>
Sincerely,<br>
<br>
Ron<br>
<br>
<br>
On 1/24/2013 10:57 PM, Boris Borisov wrote:
<blockquote
cite="mid:CABo2fvDZ5pPvhzo5G=ac9AtAD+Uy1s_z42Kk5u1R7Mj7KSSADg@mail.gmail.com"
type="cite">If your master router would allow reflashing with
opensource firmware and has enough RAM just do it. You can check on
dd-wrt, tomato openwrt sites first. Some needs to be flashed over ftp
session some over http and etc. But RAM is must. I reflashed one of
mine with dd-wrt to find out that starts to choke when you have too
many connections going it has only 16 MB i think so i reverted in back
to factory.<br>
<br>
On Thursday, January 24, 2013, Ron Frazier (ALE) <<a
moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:atllinuxenthinfo@techstarship.com">atllinuxenthinfo@techstarship.com</a>>
wrote:<br>
> Hi all,<br>
><br>
> Thanks for the input. I've seen the name ASUS come up in this
thread and also in one previously and people seem to like them. I
think Scott Castaline got one if memory serves. These can also run a
version of WRT so I can get some advanced features. I'm thinking that
I'm going to replace the master / central roter with an ASUS of one
type or another, flash it with WRT, and tinker with the QOS settings to
give priority to my wife's traffic. Also, I'm going to leave her
attached wirelessly to the NetGear that used to be mine. Hopefully, if
the one she originally had did have overheating issues, the one I was
on, which is newer, will not. I'm going to be wirelessly attached to
her old one, and if it turns out to be too flaky to use, I'll replace
it too.<br>
><br>
> I appreciate all the suggestions.<br>
><br>
> Sincerely,<br>
><br>
> Ron<br>
><br>
><br>
> Jim Kinney <<a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="mailto:jim.kinney@gmail.com">jim.kinney@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br>
><br>
>>make sure both wi-fi's are on seperate channels. setup QoS on
the wired<br>
>>to<br>
>>give priority to her MAC address. Set both wifi's in different
areas of<br>
>>the<br>
>>house for best coverage and make them slaves of the wired
router in<br>
>>infrastructure mode so she can move anyywhere and get good
signal.<br>
>><br>
>>Or setup a wire at her desk.<br>
>><br>
>>On Thu, Jan 24, 2013 at 2:13 PM, Ron Frazier (ALE) <<br>
>><a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="mailto:atllinuxenthinfo@techstarship.com">atllinuxenthinfo@techstarship.com</a>>
wrote:<br>
>><br>
>>> Hi all,<br>
>>><br>
>>> I've got an interesting and frustrating problem here at
home that I<br>
>>need<br>
>>> help with. My wife works at home using a Citrix
connection.<br>
>>Everything<br>
>>> she does comes from a remote system. I have several
computers that I<br>
>>use<br>
>>> here as well, some of which are periodically doing
automated data<br>
>>transfers<br>
>>> and backups, etc. Periodically, she complains that her
system is<br>
>>running<br>
>>> so slow that it's unusable. This is an intermittent
problem.<br>
>>Immediately<br>
>>> after she mentioned it today, I connected to her wifi
router and did<br>
>>a<br>
>>> speed test. I got .6 Mbps. Typically, I get around 28
Mbps for<br>
>>downloads.<br>
>>> I switched her to my router and the problem went away.
Now, her<br>
>>system is<br>
>>> blazing fast again.<br>
>>><br>
>>> The routers are configured as follows. This may or may
not work as a<br>
>>text<br>
>>> diagram.<br>
>>><br>
>>> Old Setup<br>
>>><br>
>>> Ron's wifi router (a) --->\<br>
>>> Master wired router (c) --->
cable modem<br>
>>> Wife's wifi router (b) -->/<br>
>>><br>
>>> New Setup<br>
>>><br>
>>> Wife's wifi router (a) -->\<br>
>>> Master wired router (c) --->
cable modem<br>
>>> Ron's wifi router (b) --->/<br>
>>><br>
>>> Hopefully, if that diagram survives the email, you can see
that she<br>
>>has a<br>
>>> wifi router and I have one. Both of those are connected
to a master<br>
>>wired<br>
>>> router that is connected to the cable modem which is
connected to the<br>
>>> internet. Normally this works very well. I like to keep
her stuff<br>
>>and my<br>
>>> stuff on separate networks. You might think, from this
description,<br>
>>that<br>
>>> router (b) is failing. And that is a possibility. I'm
prepared to<br>
>>replace<br>
>>> router (b) if I have to. However, I'm not convinced. I
rebooted<br>
>>router<br>
>>> (b) and did a speed test and it's back up in the 28 Mbps
range again.<br>
>>><br>
>>> I'm wondering if router (c) is getting confused during
times when<br>
>>both (a)<br>
>>> and (b) are putting heavy demands on the link and trying
to send /<br>
>>receive<br>
>>> more data in aggregate than the link is capable of. If
it's a<br>
>>problem of<br>
>>> bandwidth hogging by my stuff, I'd rather just curtail
that and make<br>
>>sure<br>
>>> that her stuff has at least, for example, 3 Mbps up / 6
Mbps down at<br>
>>all<br>
>>> times. All the routers are NetGear equipment. The wifi
routers have<br>
>>QOS<br>
>>> settings that I've tried to tweak in the past to address
this type of<br>
>>> problem. I haven't had much success with that. The wired
master<br>
>>router<br>
>>> does not have QOS settings. I have set up a 3 Mbps
upstream<br>
>>bandwidth<br>
>>> limit on my router, but I don't have any option to limit
downstream<br>
>>> bandwidth. My total upstream capacity is about 6 Mbps.<br>
>>><br>
>>> I need to stick with off the shelf equipment here. I
could replace<br>
>>the<br>
>>> master router (c) if needed, or stick something in between
my router<br>
>>and<br>
>>> the master router to limit my maximum bandwidth if
necessary. I<br>
>>would be<br>
>>> willing to reflash a router's firmware if necessary, but I
have to<br>
>>have<br>
>>> something that resets automatically in case of a power
failure. I<br>
>>don't<br>
>>> really want to be running another pc just for this purpose.<br>
>>><br>
>>> Any thoughts or suggestions are appreciated.<br>
>>><br>
</blockquote>
<br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
(To whom it may concern. My email address has changed. Replying to former
messages prior to 03/31/12 with my personal address will go to the wrong
address. Please send all personal correspondence to the new address.)
(PS - If you email me and don't get a quick response, you might want to
call on the phone. I get about 300 emails per day from alternate energy
mailing lists and such. I don't always see new email messages very quickly.)
Ron Frazier
770-205-9422 (O) Leave a message.
linuxdude AT techstarship.com
</pre>
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