Thank you once again (JP and muswellhillbilly) for an excellent short, succinct primer on pfSense and 3 of its packages.
I do have kids, one teen, and another tween…and I certainly like the idea of using Squid to see where they've pointed their browsers...but perhaps I'll keep that one for another day. As JP suggested....I'll "get pfsense up and running, start playing with some of the packages and if you like them and need the space then can always up the disk at later time".
I think I'll take a pass on ntop and snort as well, based on what I've learned (about those 2 packages) from the both of you.
Totally grateful to you guys for having taken the time to help me out.
Cheers