Sharing broadband

[Patrick]

Hi Sean, is there any issues sharing a broadband connection with another house, assuming there is enough speed to do everything?

Also for someone with very poor existing broadband and fibre 1km away, but not due to get fibre in foreseeable future, can a house get a second fibre connection? And will you get same speed and latency if you send this via wireless bridge to other house?

[Seán]

As the fibre connection boxes have a fixed number of ports (typically 4 per unit), it's very unlikely Eir or SIRO would run two fibre connections to a single home, especially if this prevents a neighbour from being able to get fibre.

If both homes will run off the one Internet connection, there are a few things to consider:

1. Data usage - If the remote house has a games console such as an Xbox or PlayStation, this will quickly gobble up data, particularly if the source is a 4G connection. Similarly, if either house has someone teleworking, the Internet usage of the other house could affect this, such as if they start downloading a massive video game update.
   
2. Both networks would need to be isolated from each other. Otherwise everything on the one network would be accessible from the other house and vice versa, such as wireless printers, smart speakers, Chromecast, etc.
   

The most common set up for point to point connections is a pair of of Ubquiti LiteBeams, such as the AC Gen2. From what I've heard, these easily carry 150Mbps over a 1km range and just need clear line of sight of each other. These can be configured as a wireless bridge, so effectively acts like one long Ethernet cable between the two buildings. There are various guides on YouTube showing how to set these up.

[Patrick]

Thanks Sean, I hadn't thought of access to devices. One I am currently doing is for students on working placement that were previously staying in the house, now in apartment nearby, so not an issue. 
However the example with the fibre it would be seperate households so an issue. Is a switch supporting VLANs the easiest way to isolate the two networks? Sounds like might be above my ability.

[Seán]

The simplest approach I can think of would be to add a separate wired router at each building, so each is on a separate NAT. For example, you could put a TP-Link Archer C50 AC1200 or a Huawei AX3 AX3000 (more powerful Wi-Fi 6 capable) in each building with its WAN ports running back to the LAN ports of the main ISP router:

ISP router connections
WAN -> ONT (Fibre optical network terminal)
LAN1 -> WAN port of TP-Link Archer C50 in current building
LAN2 -> Wi-Fi point to point link -> WAN port of TP-Link Archer C50 in remote building

[Patrick]

Thanks Sean, I'd need to get back to you if doing that. At least now I know what needs to be done and that it's possible. Was thinking that might also be an option for some situations where Starlink is the only option, would be a way of bringing down monthly cost, provided it proves reliable and unlimited.

[Patrick]

That worked a treat Sean. I used an old Huawei 315. I had looked up before how to reuse old router as AP and said had to change settings, I wasn't able to do it. Plugging into the WAN is as simple as you can get. I then used the Fing app to scan for devices on network and the other house did not show.