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<will@loopfree.net> 12/22/05 12:35:36 PM >>>

On Thu, Dec 22, 2005 at 12:21:55PM -0700, John Neiberger wrote:

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I'm curious to find out if there is a device that would allow a single DS3 to terminate on two different routers, and switch from the

primary

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to the backup router if the primary were to fail. I've seen this for T1 circuits but I can't find anything for DS3.

I'd bet you could make something workable with a DPDT coaxial relay, driving it from alarm contacts or a relay output of whatever monitoring system you might already have. The tricky part would probably be appropriately defining "failure" in order to get it to automatically switch at the right time without causing more problems than you started with.

http://www.rfparts.com/coaxial.html

I found what I was looking for, sort of: http://www.dataprobe.com/switch/ab_net.html They have a box that is basically an A/B switch. The failover is not automatic (they have an automatic version for T1) but it is controllable via SNMP/Web/Telnet, and it can also has a feature called Auto-Ping which will cause the switch to trip if the pings fail. However, this box does not detect if the primary CPE has failed, which is what I was hoping to get. However, this is still better than nothing and the price is only $775. John --