Cell-based OOB management devices

Tue Nov 15 17:24:20 UTC 2011

We pay $4 per SIM with at&t then about $2.50 per MB.

Cheers

Ryan

From: PC [mailto:paul4004 at gmail.com] 
Sent: Tuesday, November 15, 2011 12:15 PM
To: Ryan Finnesey
Cc: rcheung at rochester.rr.com; nanog at nanog.org; David Hubbard
Subject: Re: Cell-based OOB management devices

Second this.  Custom APN to AT&T with ipsec lan2lan VPN built to the
provider.  Works great for this.

Once you get rid of the vpn need, you can use any cheap console server.
I've seen solutions ranging from little opengear boxes (which are great to
ship to a remote site to help a tech set something up, BTW), to home-brew
solutions involving anything that can run OpenWRT, has a usb port, and can
run screen or ser2net.

Prices for low volume (10mb/month) data plans typically are less than analog
lines, too.

On Tue, Nov 15, 2011 at 10:05 AM, Ryan Finnesey <rfinnesey at gmail.com> wrote:

We do this with at&t with a custom APN works great no need to VPN.  If you
want to use Sprint take a look at Sprint Data Link.  You can use your IPs on
the data cards.

Cheers
Ryan

-----Original Message-----
From: rcheung at rochester.rr.com [mailto:rcheung at rochester.rr.com]
Sent: Tuesday, November 15, 2011 6:41 AM
To: nanog at nanog.org; David Hubbard
Subject: Re: Cell-based OOB management devices

David, a Sprint aircard can be had with a static-ip, so that should ease
remote connectivity requirements. Or, you can opt for the Datalink (private
VPN) service, which separates your aircard traffic from other customers
within a VRF, obviating the need to run a separate VPN client.

-RC

---- David Hubbard <dhubbard at dino.hostasaurus.com> wrote:
> Hi all, I am looking at cellular-based devices as a higher speed
> alternative to dial-up backup access methods for out of band
> management during emergencies.  I was wondering if anyone had
> experiences with such devices they could share?
>
> Devices I've found include Sierra Wireless AirLink Raven X, Digi's
> ConnectWAN 3G or 4G and Opengear's ACM5004-G.  I have no experience
> with any but they all appear to support the Sprint network which I
> assume would be ideal due to not having usage caps on data
> (currently).  The Opengear device runs linux and has four serial
> ports, a usb port for additional storage and ethernet, so it seems to
> have some small advantages over the others since it could double as an
> emergency self-contained management station you can SSH into and run
> diagnostics from.  All appear to have VPN/gateway support.
>
> What none of them are clear on is how you would connect to it over
> cellular since I assume you're just paying for a typical data plan and
> it will randomly obtain IP addresses.  Maybe some type of dynamic dns
> service so you can easily figure out your device's current IP?  How
> stable is the access to the device?  Any idea if any of them can do
> ipv6?
>
> Thanks!
>
> David
>
>