ESR routers now support High Availability Clustering

14 February 2024 There is a firmware update* for ESR routers now that enables High Availability Cluster Active/Standby of two ESRs. When creating a cluster, the conditions must be met: the devices must be of the same model and have the same firmware version.
* Available on request.

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Routers in a cluster are combined into a single logical device, which can be controlled as easily as a single router: single management interface and the same set of commands as for a separate ESR are used. At the same time, fault tolerance is significantly increased due to the possibility of switching to a redundant device.

At the moment, a "1+1" redundancy scheme is supported, where one router is active and the other is standby. The active router handles network traffic, monitors, configures, and updates the firmware of all cluster members. The standby router is in a hot redundancy state and takes over responsibilities of an active router in case of its failure.

It is planned to expand the redundancy scheme to a configuration with an arbitrary number of standby nodes in the near future. Performance scaling will also be supported in future versions.

The main features of the cluster:

Single point of interaction – all cluster configuration and management operations are performed through a single command interface without switching between devices.
Configurations, updates, and licenses are synchronized between cluster members via the active router on command.
Simple control – the same set of commands are used as for controlling a separate ESR router.
Fast cluster integration into the infrastructure – when replacing the router with a cluster, there is no need to reconfigure neighboring devices of the existing network.
Zero Touch Provisioning (ZTP) – to connect a new device to a cluster, there is no need to pre-configure it, the factory configuration is sufficient. In addition, you can connect a new device without interruption in service provision.

Clustering does not require separate licenses and will be available after updating the ESR router firmware. The following models are currently supported: