100 Mbit routing with Smoothwall

Johan · External Since: Dec 05, 2005 Posts: 2

Hi!
I'm planning to build a router for 100 Mbit with Smoothwall.
Is a AMD Sempron 2800+ 1.6GHz with 512 Mb RAM powerfull enough to do
the job?

A friend suggested a VIA EPIA PD10000, 1 GHz, Dual-LAN. But some of the
VIA's seem to suffer from problems with BIOS and RAM. And does
Smootwall support them?

Best regards Johan

Jeffrey Alsip · External Since: Feb 23, 2005 Posts: 15

For a Smoothwall, your system is an overkill. The PC that you describe
should be saved for use as a workstation. Try to acquire a cheap 500M
PIII system with as much ram as it will hold. It only needs a CDROM for
the brief lenghth of time neccessary to do the install...after that the
system can be stripped of all extemperanious power eating devices (CD
drive, floppy, etc.) and if possible an extra fan can be installed. Our
goal here is to create a system modified for low power use and
long-term continuos use.

A dual-lan card is ALSO an unneccessary expense. Two 3-com cards will
work just fine and you should be able to get them at about a dollar
apiece. Remember, we don't need to conserve PCI slots...the machine
should only have these two net cards installed and nothing else.

"amosf · External Since: Aug 03, 2005 Posts: 57

Johan wrote something like:

> Hi!
> I'm planning to build a router for 100 Mbit with Smoothwall.
> Is a AMD Sempron 2800+ 1.6GHz with 512 Mb RAM powerfull enough to do
> the job?

Ouch. Serious overkill. My desktops aren't that good Smile

okay, one is an
a64-2800, but the rest are less and far less.

> A friend suggested a VIA EPIA PD10000, 1 GHz, Dual-LAN. But some of the
> VIA's seem to suffer from problems with BIOS and RAM. And does
> Smootwall support them?

Overkill. Really high load maybe.

What exactly is the job? How many clients, etc?

I have about 8 clients on a pemtium 200 with 64meg ram, though it's a slow
feed here to the 10/100 net...

I'm thinking an old P2 or P3 would be heaps for anything... Get em real
cheap (usually $0 for me)...

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Leafnode. Making usenet a better place.
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Johan · External Since: Dec 05, 2005 Posts: 2

Thanks for your answers.
It's sounds like my old PIII/500 Mhz, 512 Mb, 13 Gb is good enough to
work as a firewall and router.

I will have only one client connected to the Smoothwall router on the
100 down and 10 up connection. But the ISP says "Up to 100 mbit" which
probably means 70-80 mbit and 7-8 megabyte(?)

/Johan

Aidan Karley · External Since: Jun 10, 2005 Posts: 2

In article <1133995248.049117.134740.DeleteThis@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>,
Jeffrey Alsip wrote:
> Two 3-com cards will
> work just fine and you should be able to get them at about a dollar
> apiece. Remember, we don't need to conserve PCI slots...the machine
> should only have these two net cards installed and nothing else.
>
Possibly three NICs - if you're going to have a DMZ too for your
webserver etc.

--
Aidan Karley, FGS
Aberdeen, Scotland,
Location: +57d10' , -02d09' (sub-tropical Aberdeen), 0.021233
Written at Thu, 08 Dec 2005 08:44 GMT

"amosf · External Since: Aug 03, 2005 Posts: 57

Johan wrote something like:

> Thanks for your answers.
> It's sounds like my old PIII/500 Mhz, 512 Mb, 13 Gb is good enough to
> work as a firewall and router.
>
> I will have only one client connected to the Smoothwall router on the
> 100 down and 10 up connection. But the ISP says "Up to 100 mbit" which
> probably means 70-80 mbit and 7-8 megabyte(?)

That will be heaps for the job. You won't need a 13gig drive either, but you
can't get 1 gig drives easy these days anyway Smile

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Leafnode. Making usenet a better place.
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Jeffrey Alsip · External Since: Feb 23, 2005 Posts: 15

>That will be heaps for the job. You won't need a 13gig drive either, but you
>can't get 1 gig drives easy these days anyway Smile

I was fortunate to find a matching pair of 6G drives for use in the
Smoothwall. It is critical that the two drives be an exact size and
model number match. 6G is more than enough room to build Smoothie and
every mod that I can get my hands on. When the system is running the
way I like, I can boot to a Knoppix LiveCD and copy the drive onto the
second one using dd. I then have a solid backup for use should the
original fail.