Setting up your own WAN to WAN router?

[Japlabot]

This one might be a bit of a complicated one. I'm sure that Budman will come to the rescue but anyone else feel free to chime in.

My Brother has a Cable internet connection and his ISP has some screwy routing so that when he tries to play on some gaming servers he frequents, it takes the long route from AUS to USA to Singapore, which gives ~400ms ping - too slow for a gamer - instead of going direct from AUS to Singapore. His ISP are like talking to a brick wall and he can't afford to change ISPs right now due to the high installation cost required to do so.

I have a fairly stable ADSL connection with a Static IP, Unlimited Upload/Download and I can request a /29 IP address range from my ISP at no extra charge. I get ~175ms ping to the servers he frequents which are located in Singapore, and I get ~50ms ping to my brother.

Even if this is no more than a learning experience, I suppose that it would be theoretically possible to connect a Router (Linux Box running pfSense) directly to my ADSL connection using a modem in Bridge mode so that I get a Public IP addresses directly on the Linux Box, and then configure the Linux box to route requests on this IP address to my ISP's default gateway.

Is this even possible? Would I be able to restrict IP addresses that my router will route from? Would two IPs that are on different subnets be required or would static routes work? Maybe I can split a /29 in two /30s?

[sc302 Veteran]

I think you would be better off setting up a vpn tunnel between you and your brother and have anything going to the game server go across the vpn tunnel. It would be a bit cleaner that way, possibly faster.

[fusi0n]

Not sure if I read any of this right..

But.. Maybe setup your own VPN Server and let him connect?

If I didn't read this right.. Budman will come in here and make this thread his bitch..

I think you would be better off setting up a vpn tunnel between you and your brother and have anything going to the game server go across the vpn tunnel. It would be a bit cleaner that way, possibly faster.

Looks like I did read it right :)

[Japlabot]

But how much overhead would VPN add to latency? looking for low as possible.

I think that it won't be possible to do what I'm thinking, my brother would be on a different subnet and would need to configure his default gateway to go to me, but to get to me he would need to be on his ISP's subnet. If we shared the same ISP and happen to be put in the same subnet by theoretically be possible, but if my suspicions are correct, VPN would be the only way.

Which VPN has least latency?

[sc302 Veteran]

make your own vpn. There will be less visible hops. pfsense should be able to create the vpn tunnel.

http://doc.pfsense.org/index.php/VPN_Capability_IPsec

[Japlabot]

I mean, which protocol is best for low latency? Is there a clear winner or just set them all up and trial and error?

[sc302 Veteran]

ipsec has been around forever and what cisco used forever.

webvpn is fairly new and pfsense supports it.

either should do you fine.

[+BudMan MVC]

There is not much you can do with how traffic is routed to dest from his connection. There is no way to change that.. It would come down to who the isp peers with, etc..

Going all the way to the US from AU to get to singapore sure seems like a the long way around ;)

The only way to accomplish what your after is either a vpn to your box, or a proxy you run on your box. Depending what this game server is proxy might work, if you go with vpn. All traffic could be routed through the tunnel.

Yes no matter what vpn you use its going to add a bit of latency.. Should be all that much if your talking 400 from him, and your seeing 50 from him to you, and then 175 from you to the game servers. 175 still seems like a bit much from AU to Singapore - how are you running.. Can you post up your hops? Curious to see his hops as well.

I would be curious to see the RTT I get to this game server, I have a connection in Mainland china I could test with.

As stated your best option is vpn tunnel -- as to ipsec or openvpn or something else. Pick one that your more comfortable with or more familiar with or one you would like to learn and go with it. Should really be too much difference in latency between them not when your talking like 225 anyway ;) And looking to improve upon 400.

[Billaguana]

http://homekb.cisco.com/Cisco2/ukp.aspx?vw=1&docid=785463d9ecaf4cac84aed245b08d615f_3733.xml&pid=96&slnid=4

Just do one of these. The WAN to WAN is not reliable.

[sc302 Veteran]

What does that have to do with the topic...one guy lives in one place and the other guy lives somewhere else.... doing "one of these" is not possible with the situation given.

[+BudMan MVC]

yeah that is not going to solve the issue.. Unless you have a REALLY long cable you could run to the brothers house to connect your network to his.. I was not aware his brother was in the same building or maybe across the street from him.. If that is the case then sure he could just use his brothers connection via cable or even wireless with a client bridge setup.

You really should read the post before replying ;)

[Billaguana]

Wrong link, http://www.ubnt.com/airmax#nanostationm . They provide long distance bridging. The M5 stations can go up to 15miles and their larger stations can go even further.

[+BudMan MVC]

Do you really think they could afford such a solution?

"he can't afford to change ISPs right now due to the high installation cost required to do so."

Again with 50ms rtt between him and his brothers internet - I doubt they are in range of such a solution even cost was not an issue. Might be a solution if just not able to get internet in a specific location that fell without radius of the wireless solution range.

But I would think it would be cheaper for the brother to just change his isp vs setting up a long range wireless bridge. Now that being said, you can create some long range wireless bridge solutions via DIY and cheap setup.. Making your own antenna's using cheap wireless routers, etc. Do the brothers have line of site to each other? What distance are we talking?

[Japlabot]

About 10km, non line of sight. Not going to happen. I think that will test some hosted VPNs usually used to access Australian content first. They *should* use low latency backhaul, but with the price they offer, they could just be running it off their ADSL connection too. Free trial so worth a try.

If not, I will roll my own to test with. If test is successful, might look into a VPS hosted in Australia

I will post traceroutes tonight

[+BudMan MVC]

So any traces? You got me really curious on this path that goes all the way to US from AU to get to Singapore ;)

I have been looking at global ping times between say Sydney or Melbourne and Singapore and they all suck... I see 300+ ms but can not seem to track down the path these pings are taking.