MX Cellular as an equal WAN Interface

[merakipac]

Hi,

Is there any plan for Cellular connections to be available as connection equal to the other WAN ports as opposed to fail-over only?

This is probably more of a question for a Meraki Rep, as it's obvious from the Dashboard that there are limitations with Cellular use, however I'm curious if others are interested in this feature. 

The use case may not be relevant for all markets, however in regional Australia where Fibre is not available (or is very expensive) and ADSL is slower than 4G Cellular, it would be handy to use SD-WAN features (i.e. Load Balancing/VPN) on, for example, an ADSL and a 4G Cellular connection where Cellular is not a second class citizen. We have customers that are in this situation.

Also, are there any plans for additional load-balancing mechanisms in the future (e.g. bandwidth overflow).

Thanks in advance.

EDIT: I've also raised this as a support case / make a wish.

[BlakeRichardson]

Could you not just set-up a standard WAN connection and don't plug anything in so its permanently in failover or are the settings for failover quite limiting. Sorry for my ignorance if they are we have multiple ISP connections so don't use 4G at all.

[merakipac]

Hi Blake,

Cellular certainly works as a primary if nothing is plugged into WAN1/2. The scenario I want to exploit is an internet connection on WAN1 and potentially also WAN2 with the Cellular connection treated as a WAN 3 if you like.

Configuration-wise, I'd want to be able to select "Cellular" from the "Primary Uplink" dropdown menu or as an uplink option in Load-balancing rules.

I hope that makes sense.

[DCooper · Accepted solution]

@merakipacNo plans to make the USB a part of the SDWAN Active overlay. We are pushing people in the field to use Connected IO, they have a ethernet model and ship with a IMEI for your favorite WISP. I am almost positive they have support in Australia as well. If you run up against the need for 2+ WAN connections we are pushing people to a Viptela based solution.

[merakipac]

Thanks @DCooper. Agree that an ethernet connected Cellular device is a good solution to the issue. Also good to know that Cisco is favouring Viptela in advanced SD-WAN solutions. Does that mean Meraki SD-WAN development will become a low priority?

[DCooper]

@merakipacMX product development has the most focus out of any Meraki product. SD-WAN market has a 70% YoY growth, we are investing more in SD-WAN now more than ever. If you remember the days when wireless 10+/- years ago there were 12+ vendors and it was a land grab. That is happening now in the SD-WAN marketplace. We understand we can't do everything and once you hit 3 WAN connections I promise a price tag  way beyond what your used to paying for Meraki comes with that. We have some very advanced routing and features in the development pipeline that will elevate our solution, but we can't do everything.

[s4mmy]

Ethernet cellular is great yes, but when you already have an investment in 180+ USB based devices it doesn't exactly stack up.

180 sites x around $300 for a decent Ethernet 4G device = $54,000... 😞

[merakipac]

@s4mmy. My issue exactly.

[Netify]

Newegg - Netgear LB1120-100NAS 4G LTE Modem  ===  $86.00 and free shipping

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA2F85AZ1119&ignorebbr=1

Up to 150Mbps download, 3g fallback, GigE port.

Internal WWAN antennas with support for optional TS9 external antennas
3FF (micro) SIM card slot

Configure Meraki port as WAN2(or 3), connect LB1120, boom - 'Thar be teh interwebs!'  (at least it appears that easy; haven't tested myself).

Cheers!

[GaryShainberg]

I totally agree with this request and also “made a wish”, that said a couple of weeks ago I set-up for an event and the back-haul was not installed on time so we used a 4G USB stick for 2 days whilst the fixed it. It worked well but many features for the MX did not work, which is a shame.

We all also use the PepLink BR1’s which allow two SIM’s, but has one modem and acts as a very good WAN 2 resilience option.

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@merakipac wrote:

Hi,

Is there any plan for Cellular connections to be available as connection equal to the other WAN ports as opposed to fail-over only?

This is probably more of a question for a Meraki Rep, as it's obvious from the Dashboard that there are limitations with Cellular use, however I'm curious if others are interested in this feature. 

The use case may not be relevant for all markets, however in regional Australia where Fibre is not available (or is very expensive) and ADSL is slower than 4G Cellular, it would be handy to use SD-WAN features (i.e. Load Balancing/VPN) on, for example, an ADSL and a 4G Cellular connection where Cellular is not a second class citizen. We have customers that are in this situation.

Also, are there any plans for additional load-balancing mechanisms in the future (e.g. bandwidth overflow).

Thanks in advance.

EDIT: I've also raised this as a support case / make a wish.

---

---

@merakipac wrote:

Hi,

Is there any plan for Cellular connections to be available as connection equal to the other WAN ports as opposed to fail-over only?

This is probably more of a question for a Meraki Rep, as it's obvious from the Dashboard that there are limitations with Cellular use, however I'm curious if others are interested in this feature. 

The use case may not be relevant for all markets, however in regional Australia where Fibre is not available (or is very expensive) and ADSL is slower than 4G Cellular, it would be handy to use SD-WAN features (i.e. Load Balancing/VPN) on, for example, an ADSL and a 4G Cellular connection where Cellular is not a second class citizen. We have customers that are in this situation.

Also, are there any plans for additional load-balancing mechanisms in the future (e.g. bandwidth overflow).

Thanks in advance.

EDIT: I've also raised this as a support case / make a wish.

---

[Narobix]

I’ve raised this with my rep and at event stands displaying the mx68cw recently released.
That requires a fixed wan connection before cellular works but also lacks any configuration to cellular connection itself in terms of APN and user/pw settings which is crap as I can’t use the devices without this.
I’ve also made a wish or 2

[Seb]

Have similar issue. 

I dont have Ethernet media to connect WAN 1 or WAN 2 and the MX were deployed in remote sites where 4G is only enabled. 

In order to use the 4G as primary link. I plug a cable between WAN1 and WAN2 to simulate WAN connectivity via ethernet and will fallbak to cellular after a few minutes. 

I am currently using that 4G connection for SD-WAN as if it was a primary link.

[Narobix]

Hi Seb, are you using embedded LTE model like the MX67/68? I'm curious if anyone has as bad an experience with the 4G throughput from one of these models that I am having - they seem to fail over instantly after the initial config download through a fixed WAN, and can operate on their embedded LTE thereafter but my experience with the speed of connectivity to clients on it is pretty bad and wondering if anyone else has an issue.

[JKlop]

Good-day Seb,

Thx for post, do you actually leave cable in between WAN1 and WAN2 ?

[Seb]

So I initally connected a cable to internet 1 to make MX reach the cloud, once configured 4G , I proceed to take same Ethernet cable and plug it into internet 2. 

MX fails onto 4G and I proceed to power the equipment a few times , I needed to leave that cable between wan1 and wan2 connected all the time but i lately found out that it was a code issue so you technically dont need to have it at this point.