Build Pfsense router

Ice_Black · 26 Mar 2013 at 23:29

Help me to build a Pfsense router.

Low power, very silent and it must be small

Required: A Mini ITX, two Ethernet ports and a WiFi support.

Ice_Black · 27 Mar 2013 at 14:02

I need spec suggestions guys.

Thanks

Ice_Black · 27 Mar 2013 at 14:59

Appleby said:
Do you have a budget? Is it just for home use?

My budget is around £150-£200

Yes for home use, I have a BT Hub and a plusnet router.

Ice_Black · 28 Mar 2013 at 10:58

shaf said:
I've been running pfsense router for a number of years now. I only use a fraction of the features but what it gives me is solid performance. I don't have to reboot it because it has stopped working, it does not lock up and up-time is usually months.

The normal routers I've had before this were a pain.

I bought a Zotac itx board with a pcie slot so I could fit an Intel dual/quad Nic (you can pick these up on ebay).

Could you specify which Zotac itx board model (and CPU) and do you use wifi card?

thanks

Ice_Black · 28 Mar 2013 at 15:41

TheBiznes said:
Could always go the microserver route add an Intel CT Adapter and you are good to go. I went 2008 with untangle in a VM. I use the Microserver as a PVR recording TV from 4 tuners, along with Untangle and a file server so it would be usefull to you fully loaded 45w.

You can pick a microserver up for around £100 ish second-hand. They may even put them back on offer sometime. If you want to go above 60Mbps download through Untangle in a VM is at max CPU. Pfsense has less overhead unless even with squid and snort. If you want later 100Mbps down you might need to go bare metal install.

You will not want these after install of pfsense or untangle, but you could use them as an access point for wireless. Or you could run Untangle in bridge mode.

I already have a HP microserver with ESXi installed.

I have 75Mbps internet connection from Plusnet. Is microserver powerful enough to install pfsense?

Ice_Black · 29 Mar 2013 at 10:03

TheBiznes said:
Maybe not Virtual, Bare metal yes. That is to obtain the max download of 76Mbps or greater.

Yes it is with some performance loss, it will max out the CPU at some point. I use it with Untangle in a VirtualBox installation but because Untangle is a little heavier it will max out at 50mbps down CPU wise.

In a Virtual environment it may not be powerful enough to get above this with a pfsense install even though it has less resource use. The only way to cure that is to do a bare metal install which it will be more than adequate. I have Bt Infinity but I don't torrent/download a lot. So because I want to use the Microserver to the full I sacrifice 25Mbps off the 76mbps to get Level 7 Unified Security with spyware, add removal etc.

I would try this method first with pfsense either in win2008 in a virtualbox install. Actually I do have a virtual setup with pfsense I might try later and get back to you with max throughput obtained. In ESXI it will have the same limitations being virtual. You will have to try this yourself takes only about 1/2hour to setup and try.

Just tried pfsense in Virtual Box under windows 2008 I was able to get max speed without cores maxed out. This is with snort, squid everything on the http x 6 result is probably tainted because of this. There isn't much more headroom maybe OK up to 100Mbps. I still prefer Untangle but really these are two different things ones really a dedicated router/Firewall the other a UTM.

Here is the speed result of pfsense in the virtual.

Actually as a dedicated router I would long term take this route. Perfect hardware, but I wouldn't want the extra nic card and would go with the Akasa Euler Case

Very cool!!

I am going to try it on ESXI and I let you know how I get on.

I have a BT Hub and a plusnet router (Technicolor 582n).

I think I don't need a plusnet router but just BT Hub to pfsense somehow.

Ice_Black · 29 Mar 2013 at 11:59

I want to build low profile router for pfsense only, don't need anything powerful.

My budget is max £150 if possible!