Networking/software question: Combining Internet connections?

Factual Questions
1

Is there software out there that’ll let me utilize all the available bandwidth from several simultaneous Internet connections, whenever doing so is useful and within protocol limits?

For example, I’d like a program that could parse a webpage and download each image it finds using a different connection. Or if I’m grabbing something with Bittorrent, each connection could have its own network of peers. Or if it’s something over FTP/resumable HTTP, each connection could grab a separate chunk of the file, similar to how download accelerators work.

If that’s not possible, is there at least a way to specify which connection a particular program is allowed to use? Let’s say I want my browser to use connection X and my Bittorrent client to use connection Y. Currently, even if I have two or more connections active in Windows, all my programs seem to use the newest one and the other connections are completely idle.

Basically, I’m stuck in an environment where I have multiple slow Internet connections and I want to make use of all of them. If it matters, I’m using Windows XP Pro. I also have access to OSX and Linux if they’re needed.

Thanks!

2

I’m not sure if Windows can do this, but ‘connection teaming’ and ‘load balancing’ are two search terms that you might find useful.

3

Thanks, Mangetout! I tried “load balancing”, but I mostly got results dealing with processor load balancing in distributed networks. “Connection teaming”, however, worked wonders! I found two Windows products that seem to do what I want: Vicomsoft Intergate and Midcore Midpoint.

Is anyone familiar with either product?

4

I haven’t used any of them myself; just posting because I just remembered what you’re trying to do is also sometimes called connection bonding or modem bonding.