Bonded Pipes

OWT Tech Support dlasher at owt.com
Fri Jul 25 00:07:31 UTC 1997


At 02:17 PM 7/24/97 -0800, Scott Landman wrote:
>Does anyone out there have any comment on some of the new, bonded pipe
>products like the WebRamp M3 or Transendmodem?  From what I understand they
>are saying that multiple lines can be aggregated to act as one, virtual
>line. 

I can only speak to the M3, since we've used quite a few of those already
at customer sites. 

#1 - It's NOT bonded. Though the software is intelligant enough to
round-robin the multiple connections from a web browser, you don't get
33.6+33.6+33.6 download speed. Web browsing speed IS increased, but FTP on
the other hand, isn't. 

#2 - Each modem requires an additional internet account. (At least in our
case since we don't allow multiple logins) The software lets you set
saturation points for adding each additional modem. We've found 3 users to
a modem to be about perfect. Email only can handle 10 per modem.

>My question is:  will the ISPs support multiple sessions from the same
>account (name/password) without charging N X the number of lines per hour?
>If yes, then these like like cheap alternatives to ISDN.  If not, is there
>any benefit to aggregating?

We've found the greatest niche for this product is the small office (<20)
who want to get internet access, but don't need/can't afford an ISDN
router. The M3 has a built-in DHCP server, IP Masquerading for basic
firewall, and a web interface for setup. We can literally set up a
win95/mac lan for the internet in minutes. This product is not for raw
bandwidth, but more for modem sharing. With an end-user cost of around $379
+ modems, it's almost unbeatable. Hooray to RampNet. (I don't work for
them.. I just like their products)

As an aside, one of their techs told me you could put ISDN TA's on the
ports as well. Hmmmmmm.. but still no bonding..

Donn
Tech Support - http://www.owt.com


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