OPNsense Forum

English Forums => Hardware and Performance => Topic started by: aoikite on April 12, 2019, 02:28:01 pm

Title: Personal router with old hardware (2nd try)
Post by: aoikite on April 12, 2019, 02:28:01 pm
Hello everyone.

So after a first try that i call "failed) with a laptop and pfsense that i was trying to convert into a pfsense router (i shorted something in the mobo and RIP its ethernet port), i decided to use what i had on hand knowing that normally, it should be enough but hey, i'm not expert and that's why i come to you people ^^.

Just so you know, the internet speed is not big, like at all, we're talking about 4mbps to begin with, and then upgrade to 8mbps down the line or just add a 4g data plan which in my case can be better , i don't know for sure.

as for the number of devices, it's gonna be around ten (let's say 15 just because).

i happen to have old LGA775 hardware  to which i've added two nice (pcie and pci) for a total of 3 RJ-45 port,  and yes it has no aes-ni support that's why after my first try with pfsense (people were helpful in their own way, some rude some good), i decided to go to opnsense because as far as i know, they basically have the same hardware support, but old hardware is not gonna be supported anymore (at least for now), and so this is the situation i'm in right now :
CPU : E5200 @3.6ghz
Motherboard: gigabyte g41mt-s2pt with Atheros gigabyte ethernet.
RAM: 2gb of 1333 DDR3
HDD: 80gb.

the two other nics are Realtek based chipset , but they got detected easily by Pfsense, so i am imagining that they are going to work just fine with Opnsense too.

As for the overclocking, the motherboard did it by itself for some reason, as normally the cpu is a 2.5ghz one.

after this lengthy description (i wanted to give as much detail and context as possible), after some research i guessed that my configuration should be enough for my home and the devices in it, but is the overclocking good to keep or should i just go the otherway and underclock it  for power consumption reduction if it's already overkill for our usage  at home.

what i wanna use it for ? bandwidth control, caching and with time maybe other things, i am really new to this personnal router option so i don't know what it's capable to do and can't ^^.

Thank you so much for your futur answers :)

Title: Re: Personal router with old hardware (2nd try)
Post by: chemlud on April 12, 2019, 02:39:47 pm
Welcome to the bright side of life! :-)

Your setup looks nice and overkill for private use :-D But I started with old notebooks and PC hardware as well. Later decided to buy some Decisio and now build my own boxes if I need one.

Lots to learn, start with reading forums (here and on the other sense), not everything is "intuitive" for a beginner, so better think twice before playing around (or have a dedicated box for playing around, even a raspberry pi 2 is possible for opnsense).

Have fun!
Title: Re: Personal router with old hardware (2nd try)
Post by: aoikite on April 13, 2019, 05:42:25 pm
Thank you for your reply.

I guess in the futur i can go even lower performances but modern if possible which would make it better AND smaller than a pc in a wooden box for router lol.

i will experiment with this as long as i can and see how it goes .