How does failover work?

RouterOS Beginner Basics
1

I have failover setup

1st Gateway is PPPOE over bridged modem.
2nd Gateway is DHCP assigned

Unplugging the power from the modem causes the failover to trigger to the second gateway and works as expected. When I plug the modem back in the mikrotik uses the primary gateway.
If I remove the phone line from the back of the modem this does not trigger the failover to second gateway.

My question is how does the mikrotik determine that the gateway is down? Is it purely by checking that the modem is still connected over lan? This seems to be what it is doing.

If so, is there a way that I can tell the mikrotik to ping an internet host over the PPPOE connection to determine whether the gateway is live or not?

2

Nevermind…

if you unplug the telephone line it does work. It just takes a few minutes.

3

By default the router checks the next hop for a route by the check gateway. This isn’t enough however as it doesn’t detect if there is an issue past the router, or in the providers network. So that leaves you with a few other options to better suite your needs.

1.) Write a script along with a scheduler to run every so often and see if the route works. Or use Netwatch along with a script
2.) Use the “scriptless” method described in the Wiki: http://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Advanced_Routing_Failover_without_Scripting

4

Can I see your configuration, so that I can see the way you did it. I want to know how to use it and get it implemented in my network

5

Hi

Have a look at this thread : http://forum.mikrotik.com/t/enable-second-gateway-for-failover/77937/1
Where I documented my process.

Hope it helps