Recommendations for Home Setup - Wan Optimization

[miike]

Hello All,

The more research I do, the harder it is to find and weigh a solution, so I was hoping an experienced person would have an easy and recommended solution.

I have a wired WAN connections active at home (2 providers are available) and I also have a Cradlepoint CBA850 connected to AT&T for failover. (Just got it and don't know much about Cradlepoint)

What I want, is a cost effective way to actually do more than just dumb failover, and have smart (but limited / controlled) WAN optimization (I suppose that is SD-WAN), and therefore software is needed.

My question is about hardware and software recommendations. Do any devices handle this traffic optimization on the device, without it being a crazy expensive device, or would I need some software subscription , like Micro Edge Basic ($15 / month)?

My current Setup
Router: Ubiquiti Dream Machine (UDM) (but want more than just failover)
WiFI: Unifi wired Mesh (very happy with this)

I plan to swap the UDM for another device that can handle more active management of the WAN connections.
I will keep the Unifi Wifi with a cloud key, so just looking for the WAN interface / router part.
I have no need to setup any VPN connections to offices, etc. Just internet connectivity.
I plan to optimize for video / audio conferencing using the LTE connection, and otherwise use the LTE for failover to keep data costs down.

That is my primary question. what device + software do you recommend?
Can the CBA850 handle this?
What device / solution would you recommend? I am posting here because I was considering the Untangle e3, but was also looking at other solutions like Mikrotik, etc.

Thanks much in advance.

[dashpuppy]

Hello All,

The more research I do, the harder it is to find and weigh a solution, so I was hoping an experienced person would have an easy and recommended solution.

I have a wired WAN connections active at home (2 providers are available) and I also have a Cradlepoint CBA850 connected to AT&T for failover. (Just got it and don't know much about Cradlepoint)

What I want, is a cost effective way to actually do more than just dumb failover, and have smart (but limited / controlled) WAN optimization (I suppose that is SD-WAN), and therefore software is needed.

My question is about hardware and software recommendations. Do any devices handle this traffic optimization on the device, without it being a crazy expensive device, or would I need some software subscription , like Micro Edge Basic ($15 / month)?

My current Setup
Router: Ubiquiti Dream Machine (UDM) (but want more than just failover)
WiFI: Unifi wired Mesh (very happy with this)

I plan to swap the UDM for another device that can handle more active management of the WAN connections.
I will keep the Unifi Wifi with a cloud key, so just looking for the WAN interface / router part.
I have no need to setup any VPN connections to offices, etc. Just internet connectivity.
I plan to optimize for video / audio conferencing using the LTE connection, and otherwise use the LTE for failover to keep data costs down.

That is my primary question. what device + software do you recommend?
Can the CBA850 handle this?
What device / solution would you recommend? I am posting here because I was considering the Untangle e3, but was also looking at other solutions like Mikrotik, etc.

Thanks much in advance.

Look at the E6 or the Z4.

[donhwyo]

Take a look at openwrt. It can run on a lot of routers and even x86 or a vm. It is what sd-wan is based on. Just without the fancy gui.

[LaurentR]

What do you want to do in terms of "WAN Optimizations"? Untangle will let you do a decent amount, including (static) load balancing and statically associating devices to different WAN interfaces.

Beyond that, if you need something that dynamically picks the best connection for different types of traffic based on network conditions, no on-premise firewall will let you do that. You have to use a third-party device out on the Internet to re-aggregate your traffic. One simple solution is to use a service like Speedify. Other options include running your own software on an instance in the cloud.