Soldato
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Nice and easy
pfsense/opnsense
- Thread starter The1nonly1
- Start date
Nice and easy
Think I'm going to give Opnsense ago soon.
Hardware wise these seem great for a tidy install with plenty of power.
protectli.com
Hardware wise these seem great for a tidy install with plenty of power.
VP2420 - 4x 2.5G Port Intel ® Celeron J6412 - Protectli EU
Intel Celeron® J6412 Quad Core at 2 GHz (Burst up to 2.6 GHz) 4 Intel® 2.5 Gigabit Ethernet NIC ports M.2 SATA SSD Slot (Note: This device does not support NVMe drives) 16 GB eMMC module on board Intel® AES-NI support Fanless and Silent Included 12v Power Supply, VESA mount kit, Serial...
protectli.com
Soldato
Think I'm going to give Opnsense ago soon.
Hardware wise these seem great for a tidy install with plenty of power.
VP2420 - 4x 2.5G Port Intel ® Celeron J6412 - Protectli EU
Intel Celeron® J6412 Quad Core at 2 GHz (Burst up to 2.6 GHz) 4 Intel® 2.5 Gigabit Ethernet NIC ports M.2 SATA SSD Slot (Note: This device does not support NVMe drives) 16 GB eMMC module on board Intel® AES-NI support Fanless and Silent Included 12v Power Supply, VESA mount kit, Serial...
Those are good, by buying Protectli you do pay a premium for some reason. Local UK warehouse maybe? And there are dozens of other suppliers doing almost identical gear for significantly less money. Topton are probably the best known. I’ve found the Intel i226V chipsets better than the i225V because even if the i225V is labelled as the v3 version they often seem to have all the issues of the earlier versions which makes me suspicious about whether or not it is actually a v3 chipset.
Soldato
If you are buying from Topton(and from China) be mindful of this period being their holidays. Slim chance of getting anything before the end of this month.
They just like ideal, can order it off Amazon. Plenty of support available.
Get the barebones one and put my own RAM and M.2 drive in it.
2.5Gbe seems a safe bet for the foreseeable future on the WAN port.
Is this the sort of thing you were suggesting.
168.62ï¿¡ 38% OFF|Topton 12th Gen Firewall Router Celeron J6413 J6412 6x Intel I226-v 2500mbps Nics Fanless Mini Router Pc Opnsense Proxmox - Barebone & Mini Pc - AliExpress
Smarter Shopping, Better Living! Aliexpress.com
www.aliexpress.com
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Soldato
They just like ideal, can order it off Amazon. Plenty of support available.
Get the barebones one and put my own RAM and M.2 drive in it.
2.5Gbe seems a safe bet for the foreseeable future on the WAN port.
Is this the sort of thing you were suggesting.
168.62ï¿¡ 38% OFF|Topton 12th Gen Firewall Router Celeron J6413 J6412 6x Intel I226-v 2500mbps Nics Fanless Mini Router Pc Opnsense Proxmox - Barebone & Mini Pc - AliExpress
Smarter Shopping, Better Living! Aliexpress.com
Yes, that’s the sort of thing.
If you want more details and info on these Chinese routers, the 2 imo best threads are here and here also Servethehome youtube does excellent reviews so its worth checking there too.
I don't mind topton, but in the past there were hardware issues, bios issues and sometimes a lack of support or communication. cwwk units are generally more pricey, but offer support/communication and bios updates at least and also decent hardware in general.
Buying from Amazon though will give much better support so def go there if you can.
I don't mind topton, but in the past there were hardware issues, bios issues and sometimes a lack of support or communication. cwwk units are generally more pricey, but offer support/communication and bios updates at least and also decent hardware in general.
Buying from Amazon though will give much better support so def go there if you can.
Soldato
We buy about 10 of these a month and there is ZERO support from any Chinese supplier I’m aware of. We always pay by PayPal just in case. Amazon don’t do support. All Amazon will do is give you a refund. Bottom line, these are dirt cheap mini-PCs that all use variations on the same motherboard and cooling solution. I would NEVER buy the ones with RAM or SSDs just because they’re generally not amazing.
I’ve never had to update the BIOS on one in 3 years and the failure rate in use has been zero. You do occasionally get one out of the box and the PSU is dead but they’re easy to source from Farnell etc. I’ve never had an actual PC that didn’t boot up.
Brilliant to know, I went amazon with an N100 topton recently, certainly sounds far more easier going amazon route if they just refund did you have to send the faulty unit back? Issue with cwwk is you have to send the item back to china and it cost £35 via ups otherwise.
I have used cwwk support before but yeah slightly tricky via their main site, I ended up using a chat via aliexpress messaging service and got support and even a replacement mobo from them.
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Soldato
never recommended to use pfsense/opnsense router as a switch.
whats your use case for 2.5Gb speeds? do you have >1Gb/s internet?
Not yet. I want it to be somewhat future proof and faster than 1Gb is coming to my postcode soon.
Kind of annoying that these devices as you go up the specs also increase the ports seemingly unnecessarily. I mean 2 would be plenty then, why do I need 4 or 6.
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Soldato
some use the other ports for different physical subnets on their network
As you have found, upgrading to 2.5Gbe isnt cheap do, id grab the 2.5gbe router, setup opnsense and grab the 2.5gbe switch when the time comes.
A primary service and a backup, your main LAN and a separate one for CCTV connected to a separate PoE switch would take up four interfaces and it's not that uncommon to have that sort of setup.
Associate
An unmanaged 4 x 2.5G Ethernet + 2 x 10G SFP switch is about £25 on aliexpress. Managed and higher port ones are not a lot more.
I spent some time looking into getting something either off the shelf or building my own router for Opnsense, but decided against it for what I needed. I have a 3GB broadband line and trying to build something compact enough and power efficient with at least dual 10GB ports and some extra LAN ports seemed to have lots of caveats. A lot of the stuff from China looked good on paper, but I was concerned about support down the line and the hassle if something went wrong with the hardware.
To build something, would have meant needing a poweful setup to resolve the 10GB speeds and felt I would have needed something bigger than a Lenovo M720q or Dell Optiplex, plus concerns over power efficiency to be used 24/7.
To build something, would have meant needing a poweful setup to resolve the 10GB speeds and felt I would have needed something bigger than a Lenovo M720q or Dell Optiplex, plus concerns over power efficiency to be used 24/7.
Soldato
What did you do the end ? Use isp router?
The router supplied with the Community Fibre 3GB line is a Technicolor (FGA5330CFL) and is quite locked down - it didn't even allow me to do something basic such as changing the DNS servers! So I needed something else.
Outside of DIY (Lenovo M720q/Dell OptiPlex) or the Chinese boxes (CWWK/Topton), I realised quite quickly that there isn't a whole lot of choice when looking for routers with dual 10GB ports in the UK right now. The only ones I could find were as follows:
- ASUS RT-AX89X - One of the cheaper options, but getting old in the tooth now and does not have Merlin support.
- ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AXE16000 - Powerful, but not cheap and very big. Does have Merlin support though.
- ASUS RT-BE96U - New Wi-Fi 7 router. Could have been an option, but no sign of it in the UK so far.
- ASUS ROG Rapture GT-BE98 - Wi-Fi 7 support with dual 10GB ports as well as 4 x 2.5GB LAN. Probably was my ideal choice, but it's only just been released, so super expensive (£720!)
- QNAP QHORA-301W - A bit old now and questionable software, but nice and compact.
- QNAP QHora-322 - Newer version of the 301W with great specs (3 x 10GB ports and 6 x 2.5GB ports), although no wireless. Not an issue for me, as I use a seperate mesh AP system. Was definitely in the running, although again concerned about software and warranty support.
- Ubiquiti Dream Machine Special Edition - Heard good things, but didn't like needing an account just to set up the system. Don't really have room for this rack-type system.
- Mikrotik CCR2004-16G - Heard that Mikrotik software is very complicated which put me off.
- TP-Link ER8411 Omada - Good value for money, but not sure on software and again didn't have room for the rack.
- Draytek Vigor 3910 - Enterprise rack router and very expensive.
I ended up going for the ASUS GT-AXE16000 router, given the balance of cost/features/support.
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Soldato
good choice! I assume you have a 10Gb network card in your PC then to utilise the 3GB?
Yes correct, it's complete overkill though!
The main reason why I opted for 3GB is that I'm paying the same as I was for BT Fibre 500MB. I was really keen to give Opnsense a go, but I don't think 10GB DIY hardware is viable right now to do it cost effectively in terms of running costs. Hopefully, things will be different in a year's time or so.