It was a normal Saturday morning on the Highveld. ☀️ The birds were chirping, the coffee was strong, and all was right in the world. Then, just before noon, the sky turned dark… 😱
A storm that skrik vir niks rolled in. The rain belted down in a proper cloudburst, and the thunder rumbled like the Gods Must Be Crazy. ⚡⛈️ BOOM! Out of nowhere, a lightning bolt yeeted straight into an advertising board down the road. Next thing, sheet lightning cascaded over the house, and—BANG! 💥 Earth leakage tripped!
Now, in that moment, I knew things were about to get interesting. 😬
The Damage Report 🛠️
✔️ Geyser? Fried. Plumber’s only coming Monday. 😑
✔️ Two network switches? Gone. Burnt toast. 🍞
✔️ Wireless access point? RIP. 🚫📡
✔️ Raspberry Pi NAS baked like an apple pie! 🍏🥧
✔️ One Ethernet port on the Nepean Networks’ SD-WAN device? Toasted. (Thankfully, just a LAN port!)
And yet, despite the chaos, I was still online! 🏆 One Wireless access point was still functioning and the Gizzu mini UPS was working keeping the Internet up. But that all changed when I rebooted the device to check if the port would come up. Turns out the hard disk had been corrupted and the device was running in memory. If I’d not rebooted then connectivity would not have dropped.
The Recovery 🔄
Luckily, I had some spares:
✅ Two extra network switches ready to deploy.
✅ A spare access point (now all running OpenWrt—silver linings! 🌩️).
✅ And most importantly… a spare Nepean Networks’ SD-WAN device! 🎩✨
But here’s the real magic: 💡
1️⃣ I jumped onto the Antares portal.
2️⃣ I provisioned the new device’s MAC address.
3️⃣ Plugged in the cables.
4️⃣ And BOOM! Connectivity restored—faster than Eskom can say "Stage 6"! ⚡💨
The Real MVP | Juggler 🏅
If this had been a normal router or firewall-based "SD-WAN" setup, I’d be stuck fiddling with configs, calling support, or lighting a candle for better days. 🕯️
But thanks to Nepean Networks' Juggler service, I was back online in minutes. ⏳ No hassle, no drama—just plug, provision, and play. 🎮
💡 Moral of the story? Sometimes, the gods are crazy, but if you’ve got Nepean Networks’ SD-WAN, at least your network stays sane. 😎
Why Every Business Needs This ⚙️
💼 If a lightning strike can knock out my gear but not my connection, imagine what Nepean Networks’ SD-WAN can do for a business that actually depends on uptime?
✔️ Hardware failure? No problem.
✔️ Provisioning? Automated.
✔️ Failover? Seamless.
✔️ SD-WAN that actually works? Jy weet mos!
Nepean Networks’ SD-WAN saved my bacon—and it can save yours too! 🥓🔥
#LekkerSDWAN #NoDowntime #FusionForTheWin 🚀
