Hi guys,

I´m a complete newbie in the Mikrotik world so please bear with me while solving this question:

I´ve just purchased a Mikrotik HAP ac router to replace a TP-Link Archer C7 one. My ISP uses a ZTE F660 GPON router to provide Fiber Optic internet access. My old setup was connecting the TP-Link router to the ZTE one to get wireless and certain network control utilities and features not available in the F660.

I want to replace the TP-Link hardware with the HAP ac, nonetheless I don´t want to completely bypass the ZTE router for the time being. My idea is to pass all traffic from my ISP router to the Mikrotik device and control my network from it, this is, set up the ISP router as a bridge.

I´ve tried the basic initial configuration found on the Mikrotik wiki but as soon as I connect the HAP ac to the main router (using port eth1 on the Mikrotik) I lose internet access and I can´t access the default gateway (ISP router). When I connect the main router to a different port on the HAP ac, I regain access but all the traffic is just passing through. I tried disabling the firewall on the ac, without success.

Do I have to create a PPoE interface on the HAP ac to make things work? Is it possible to configure it as an AP and at the same time, act as a DHCP server for the network? I tried configuring it both from Winbox and WebFig. Specifically, I need the HAP to create several VLANs to isolate certain types of traffic in my home network (IoT devices) and to apply QoS to others, so this is the main reason for using this hardware.

If you require further information about the setup and what I´m trying to accomplish, please ask away.

Any ideas would be appreciated. Thank you.

For the sake of completeness, this is my intended setup:



Do I have to create a PPoE client at the Mikrotik side? Is it not possible just to configure it as an AP with extended features (DHCP, VLANs, QoS, etc) without changing the main ZTE router configuration as a bridge?

Your comments and insights are most welcome. Once again, thank you.

How is the F660 router set up? I don't know the model, but a quick search suggests it's capable of doing PPPoE passthrough. The advice on how to configure the hAP will depend on how the F660 is configured.

Most people would I suspect configure the F660 for PPPoE passthrough and use the hAP as the main router. You should understand how to configure the hAP as a firewall before you do that though as in passthrough mode, the F660 will not do the firewall and you could leave your network open to the Internet.

I suspect the fact that you are having issues with connecting via Ether 1 probably means that you are not doing PPPoE passthrough and as a result, in the diagram you gave, the F660 is still the main router and the Internet gateway. n which case, you should configure the hAP as a switch only, rather than the router that you currently have it configured for. Even though you probably have the hAP configured as a router, in the default configs, ports 2 to 5 would be configured as a switch, which is why things work when you connect to a port other than eth1.

Sensibly, I think you have two choices. Configure the F660 for PPPoE passthrough and use the hAP as your main network router, or leave the F660 as your main router and configure the hAP as a switch. Either way, you can configure the hAP as an AP and use it for the main DHCP.