Merging 2 networks

Kurt Clark

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Mar 14, 2017
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I have 2 groups of people working:
Room1 - has 3 PC's
A, B and C
and all are connected to one network via a ethernet switch, also A shares internet to B and C via a 4g usb dongle

Room2 has 3 PC's
D, E and F
and all are connected to one network via another ethernet switch, also D shares internet to E and F via a 4g usb dongle.

As we see we have 2 groups that has their own network.

I would like to connect all 6 to the same network, primarily so that all can share files over lan and also internet sharing.
The simple way of doing this is to disconnect 1 dongle and allow all users to connect to internet only using one dongle and then join the 2 groups with a ethernet cable so they can access each other.

However is there a way in which we keep both the dongles and yet continue sharing internet and yet all 6 PC's are connected to the same network?
 
What is the topology between the two switches in the different rooms? Do they share a switch? What is the subnetting scheme on this network?
 
You can accomplish the last part by having all the PCs on the same IP range, same subnet but specify the gateway for each. In your case, the gateway for 3 of the PCs would be A and the other 3 would be D.
 
I've had to do something similar in a pinch from a customers hotspot. If the hotspot allows you to login and change the IP range to whatever you need you can just us a network bridge or a router that supports bridge mode (a nighthawk in my case) and plug it into a switch.

If you aren't so lucky (when I had to use a phone hotspot) You can configure the bridge and just connect it to the WAN port on a router and configure as needed.

It may be worth checking with the ISP if they have a better solution for this now. I recently had a customer move to a 4g att plan and thought it was going to be a disaster but when I got onsite att had provided a 4g modem \ router that actually had network ports and could be configured just like a standard ISP modem \ router unit.
 
I missed OPs last sentence. You could setup a software based vpn I guess if you really wanted to get crazy and keep both dongles.

Getting rid of the stupid dongles sounds like a better solution tho.

Probably beyond the scope of options but you could also go with something terminal services based (cloud or local). Then everyone can work via rdp as if in the same location regardless of internet \ network source.
 
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if they can be in the same subnet (ip range) then anly switch without any major config is needed however if not then you will need a router.
 
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