Question 1

I have 2 connections of 1 mbps , and i want to combine these two connection to give me a 2 mbps connection over a wired lan, will this router help?

Accepted Answer

I have several of these routers, though I've never used them for load balancing.

Per the RV042 help file:

Load Balance: Choose this mode to use both Internet connections simultaneously to increase the available bandwidth. The router balances the traffic between the two interfaces in a weighted round robin fashion.

Sounds like it should do what you want

Question 2

wireless range?

Accepted Answer

The Wireless Range on this unit is ZERO.  
This is a Wired Dual Wan Router with a 4 Port 10/100 Wired Switch ONLY.

Question 3

this router is wired or wireless??

Accepted Answer

This router does not have a wireless radio.  It is a business-class router with dual WAN and fail-over capability.  No "wireless router" that I have ever used has very good wireless capability.  Or very good VPN/router/firewall capability for that matter.  Get an EAP600 to go with this unit and you'll be all set.

Question 4

In order to setup the VPN does this router need 2 static IPs or can I get away with just 1?

Accepted Answer

You can set the router up using Dynamic, Static or a combo of the 2. For instance you want to work from home. The office would typically have a static IP and you could sign in from home as a client using a Domain name or email address.

I haven't messed around with them too much as all my equipment VPN tunnels use static IP's, but functionality is there.

Question 5

Is this the "2nd generation" RV042?  Our IT people are referring to this model # RV042 but "2nd generation".

Accepted Answer

Cisco has software for rev 1 and 2 or rev 3. When I bought mine a month or so ago it was rev 3 which will not take the rev 1 or 2 software. I have an old rev 1 as well and there are some differences but I was able to use them a early rev and the rev 3 in a local simulation of VPN and to test the second connections. That said it was not in a production environment. I hope this helps.

Question 6

is this firmware above 4.0?

Accepted Answer

Yes; our latest was v4.2.2.08 which we updated to v4.2.3.03

Question 7

DHCP support ?

Accepted Answer

Yes it does, but DHCP Relay not working for me with vpn clients, may not be an issue with the router!

Question 8

I would like to use this router either for failover backup or Load balancing of two MPLS VPN links of 2 mbps each. Pls. confirm whether it will work ?.

Also pls. confirm incase of load balancing whether a single output from this router be taken to a firewall.

Accepted Answer

Yes this router does support failover and load balancing on the two WAN ports.

The router has a 4 port integrated switch.  You can disable any/all of the 4 ports or set each port individually with a priority of normal or high or with a VLAN of VLAN1 thru VLAN4.  No other options available on the 4 ports that I can find.

Question 9

Can I turn off all incoming and outgoing ports in the firewall?

Accepted Answer

Yes you can.  Incoming are all off my default.   You can also set time and day restrictions.  I used mine to set up a VPN link for always on connectivity between to physical locations.

Question 10

Do you know if this router will support Option 156?

Accepted Answer

Hi shopper, 
I do believe you can setup the VLAN to do a DHCP Relay to obtain 156 VOIP config from a server, it uses Vyatta, in case you want to look some commands up.  I'm not a switch pro by any means, but the CLI offers a lot features that the GUI doesn't have.  But just to give you a heads up when I was configuring DHCP options on the VLAN I didn't see an option for 156, but that was the GUI.  I don't know if you would be able to do it via CLI.

Hope that helps you out.

Questions & Answers