Hi,

we have a server (with a Gigabit nic) located in room #1 and a NAS (with Gigabit nic) located in room #2. Both rooms are connected by eight Cat 5 cables. Maximum throughput over each cable is slightly more than 100 MBit/s.

Is it possible to aggregate the eight links to a virtual line with an effective throughput of 800 MBit/s?

As regards LACP I read that each source machine always uses the same cable, so that an aggregation of the eight lines would only be useful if we had several servers to backup, each able to use a portion of 100 MBit/s (one cable) of the virtual 800 MBit/s. In our case, our single machine should be able to get an effective throughput of 800 MBit/s to the NAS.

Is this possible with Mikrotik and if so, which protocol should we use?

Thanks a lot for your advice!

M.

check out

http://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Manual:In ... ding_modes

transmit-hash-policy (layer-2 | layer-2-and-3 | layer-3-and-4; Default: layer-2)
layer-3-and-4 - is probably what you are looking for but not all switches handle it. and not all OS handle it

so are you thinking

server A -> routeros -> 8 wan links -> routeros -> backup server

probably be okay. But why are you getting only 100Mb/s over the links.

isn't cat 5 suitable for 1Gb/s http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category_5_cable

If you want one connection to use all the 8 cables at once, use bonding in balance-rr mode (balance per packet). Your aggregated thruput will be 8 x the slowest link minus some %.

isn't cat 5 suitable for 1Gb/s http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category_5_cable

Currently we get 100 MBit/s, probably because of the wiring. I will check this.

Thanks!

If you want one connection to use all the 8 cables at once, use bonding in balance-rr mode (balance per packet). Your aggregated thruput will be 8 x the slowest link minus some %.

So using mode balance-rr together with hash policy "layer 3 and 4"?

Do both bonding interfaces need to get assigned an IP address, as in http://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Manual:In ... etup_Guide ?

Could I use two RB2011iL-RM, see http://routerboard.com/RB2011iL-RM ? This device has two switches, a five-port 100 MBit/s switch and a five-port Gigabit switch. Could I use all ports of one switch together with 3 ports of the other for my purpose?

If you use bonding, disable the switch feature. All 8 ethernet links must be independant and with no IP assigned.
On each side, add 1 bonding interface in balance-rr mode and add all 8 ethernet ports as slaves. Then add 1 IP adress to the bonding interface.
You can use the 3 other available ports for your purpose, but make sure they are not in the same switch than the 8 slaves.