I would like a new routing box.

M

munkle

[H]F Junkie
Joined
Jan 16, 2005
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Right now I have a dell server with pfsense. It's a pentium d 3.0ghz, with 2gb of ram, intel nic with 2 ports, and a raid 1 array (I think a drive died because it started a earpiecing beep at 3am and woke me up).

I have a spare e4600, mobo, and ram I could use. I'm just wonder if there is something that would use less power and heat that would be cheap. I would prefer to stay away from atom boards, and I would use a dual port intel nic. Would the g620/h61 be the best bet?
 
Well if you don't want an atom board, take a look at the new amd equivalent (fusion?). It's supposed to use the same power but be faster than the atom.
 
Biznatch said:
Well if you don't want an atom board, take a look at the new amd equivalent (fusion?). It's supposed to use the same power but be faster than the atom.
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cpu wise it isn't that much better, it's main advantage is the gpu which I don't need (and personally I would like to stay away from anything ati, Ive had driver problems from x800xl all the way to 6850, finally switched to green team). Price isn't much different between a e-350 and g620/h61 combo on sale.
 
seems like both are overkill, I wouldn't waste a decent box like that on a home firewall
 
munkle said:
. I'm just wonder if there is something that would use less power and heat that would be cheap. I would prefer to stay away from atom boards, and I would use a dual port intel nic. Would the g620/h61 be the best bet?
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I'm curious why you want to stay away from an Atom board? A dual core Atom like a 510 or a 525 don't even break a sweat with something as light as PFSense. You want less power and heat....so logically gotta step out of the full size CPUs.
 
YeOldeStonecat said:
I'm curious why you want to stay away from an Atom board? A dual core Atom like a 510 or a 525 don't even break a sweat with something as light as PFSense. You want less power and heat....so logically gotta step out of the full size CPUs.
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I would also use Atom if I were going to drop coin on a new setup and wanted it x86. Only reason to use a larger system is if you already have the hardware on hand and don't want to spend some coin. (Or if you have special requirements and intend to provide rich services on the box.)
 
YeOldeStonecat said:
I'm curious why you want to stay away from an Atom board? A dual core Atom like a 510 or a 525 don't even break a sweat with something as light as PFSense. You want less power and heat....so logically gotta step out of the full size CPUs.
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I just don't like atom for the price that they want. :p If the super micro atom board was affordable I would get that one but that's just too much to me. The cheapest atom board I can find with a pci-e slot (for the dual port gigabit intel nic) is $100, when the g620/h61 combos are on sale they are only a tiny bit more (like $110) for a ton more performance (maybe not as important for pfsense but if I ever repurpose the pc) even cheaper if you have a microcenter ($80).

The g620 doesn't use all that much power either, but it is more than atom, but at full load it is alot less than the pentium d at idle I have right now.
 
Depending on network traffic you could even get something as low power as an Alix board.
 
I'm all for pfsense and efficient low power systems, but it doesn't make sense to me to spend money on something like this when it runs just as well on a p3 or p4 shit box that you can come across for next to nothing, and the savings in power would takes years to come into play.
 
aaronearles said:
I'm all for pfsense and efficient low power systems, but it doesn't make sense to me to spend money on something like this when it runs just as well on a p3 or p4 shit box that you can come across for next to nothing, and the savings in power would takes years to come into play.
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I have a p4 2.4, 1gb ram that I used, before that I had a celeron 700 with 512mb ram, and a p3 733 with 512mb ram.
 
so why not just continue to run off those? mine is running on a 1.6GHz P4 with 512MB and an old 20GB IDE drive, still cpu and mem usage are very low, and it pulls like 60W at the outlet. I just don't see any reason to upgrade unless you have a 100Mbps internet pipe or something.
 
aaronearles said:
so why not just continue to run off those? mine is running on a 1.6GHz P4 with 512MB and an old 20GB IDE drive, still cpu and mem usage are very low, and it pulls like 60W at the outlet. I just don't see any reason to upgrade unless you have a 100Mbps internet pipe or something.
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I like beefy routers.
 
Or if you need to use your router to crack password hashes / look for aliens / cure cancer, etc.
 
PS - You don't NEED PCI-E for a dual port NIC. Hit up eBay for a PCI-X dual port Intel NIC. I'm running one on my atom board for Untangle. It only has a regular PCI slot, but it still works, juet overhangs. It runs like a champ.
 
Viotech 3100+

Silent, no moving parts, VIA C7 1.6GHz is plenty for routing, low power, has PCI-E and PCI, RAID all that good stuff. Sounds like it would be good for a home router board.
 
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corge said:
Fit PC? http://www.fit-pc.com/web/

I have used these with pFsense and they work EXCELLENT. They have dual intel NICs on-board.
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McDonald's uses those for their digital menu boards, they are pretty cool. Says something about their reliability when a company like McDonalds invests a few million in them.
 
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bds1904 said:
McDonald's uses those for their digital menu boards, they are pretty cool. Says something about their reliability when a company like McDonalds invests a few million in them.
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yeah and they stand up to all that abuse and grease :)
 
corge said:
Fit PC? http://www.fit-pc.com/web/

I have used these with pFsense and they work EXCELLENT. They have dual intel NICs on-board.
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From the specs, it seems they are using Realtek 8111 chips for their dual-LAN, not INTEL.

Very interesting though. Really good contender for PFSense, but 2 Intel NICs would be perfect.
 
http://www.logicsupply.com/products/nc92_330_lf

Throw on an appropriate daughtboard for your usage, add some memory and storage and you're good to go. I'm using several of these with the Realtek modules running Untangle and it keeps my remote locations running just fine. If you don't want to use the Realtek modules, just throw in the 3x Intel module.
 
I just got myself a mini-itx Intel DQ67EP and one of those new 2100T processors with 35w TDP. I'm still in disbelief for the amount of processing power this thing packs for its size (no bigger than a regular 3.5" external USB drive) and max power usage - 25w idle, 45w max load. Currently serving as (1) dumb terminal (2) 2 pfsense routers (3) 4 other various VMs.

Other than having only one network interface card with the inability to expand, this thing rocks!
 
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