ok, I have played with this set up for a couple of days and got nowhere!

router 1) 2820vn (192.168.1.1) main wifi access point and default gateway configured with a BT internet connection on Wan1 (ppoa)

router 2) 2820 (192.168.1.2) secondary unit configured with an Opal internet connection on wan 1 (ppoa)

Router 1 is joined to router 2 via the Wan2 port into an open network port on router 2

What exact settings do i need to change on each router to make the wan2 on router 1 work. As every combination I have tried fails as either "failed on the server side" or "not connected" .... both routers get thier internet connection without issue and by switching the default gateway on a local client pc I am able to browse the internet over each connection.

regards,

Dan.

First off, put the LAN side of router 2 onto a different subnet, e.g. 192.168.2.x.

Ideally you want to put router 2 into bridge mode, then configure WAN2 of router 1 as PPPoE.

For starters you should not need to do that. Just put router 2 onto a different subnet and connect WAN2 of router 1 to the LAN of router 2. This should work directly, but you may bump into DNS issues so you would do best to use a public DNS service such as OpenDNS rather than your ISP's DNS.

thanks, How do i put the 2820 in bridge mode ?

and is there a way to admin router 2 from router 1's lan when they are on diff subnets ?

I did not realise your second router was a 2820 - your first post said 2020.

I've no idea if you can put a 2820 into bridge mode. Hopefully someone else will post, but is is a great waste of such a powerful router. To be honest you'd be better off just getting a good ADSL modem for WAN2 - it will perform better than the modem in the 2820.

For the moment, don't bother with bridge mode. If you put router 2 onto a separate subnet, then you will be able to administer it from the LAN side of the first router. If they are on the same subnet, you will not be able to contact router 2!

hmm, ok that doesnt seem to stack up!

if the ip of router 1 is 192.168.1.1 and router 2 is 192.168.2.1 (both with a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0 then client addressed 192.168.1.10 shouldnt see router 2 from the lan side should it ?

regards,

Dan.

That is not right otherwise you would never see the internet!

What the router does is look at the destination of the packet - in your case, 192.168.2.1 - and sees if it is on its own subnet. If it is not on its own subnet, it then goes out onto the WAN to look for it. That is how it finds all the internet addresses. E.g. it looks up www.draytek.co.uk and converts it to an IP address (82.165.104.233), checks if it is on your LAN, which it is not, then goes to find it on the internet.

The only minor complication there may be is that you may need to set up a rule to force traffic to 192.168.2.0/24 through WAN2. I don't think you need to.