ive noticed the same thing on some pcmcia cards, just type the interface name, instead of typing "a" type the name of your other nic, should be displayed what cards have been detected. /F

Make sure install boot blocks is checked.  Check install grub.

@AndrewBorem: I appreciate all of the help you guys have given.  In the past, that is.  Searching this forum gave me the answers I needed. ;D  Glad to hear it!  There is a wealth of information here, just a matter of looking for it.

http://forum.pfsense.org/index.php?action=search keywords: "dynamic" "IP" "IPSEC" (22nd hit) (IPSec tunnel and dinamic IP) If you cannot get this to work with this thread, you will have to wait until 1.3 RC's are released.

Yes, the use of a single card and VLANs has been discussed in a number of threads.

Just a few quick notes- All inbound traffic is denied by default. When you create a port-forward, there is an option to create the firewall rule. It's checked by default. To ping the firewall, you would need to add a rule on the WAN to allow ICMP to the WAN address. If you are using proxy-arp VIPs and port-forwards, the VIPs will not be pingable, even with ICMP allowed.

Just tryed with "physdiskwrite" and it worked. Much more simple ! Thanks.

It's running now ! i have disabled USB support in BIOS , changed MPS Table from 1.4 to 1.1 and i also disabled all other boot devices except CDROM . Now i was able to install pfsense including the onboard RAID Controller . I have also switched back to MPS 1.4 and system is still running .

You are absolutely right, I am sorry, looks like I did not use the right search terms. This is what came up, so now I need to know if this is still the way to do it, and if yes, how to make that additional configuration permanent to be established on boot (I am not familiar with the way some manual additions are added to the pfSense way of system configuration).

Thanks, got it installed by changing from auto-detect to LBA for that hard drive.  I had another error, I installed GRUB and got "Error 18" which I didn't feel like researching so I reinstalled without GRUB.  Everything seems to be working fine now.

@hoba: Not doable in 1.2. pfSense uses a completely different shaper. Might/should be possible in 1.3. we would like to wait…. :o

It would look like this:                       ----nat-router----OPT1                     /                      pfSense LAN ----- clients/server ISP-Link----- switch -------------------WAN

I suspect you want a "transparent firewall". The users dont notice anything that they are being filtered / protected but you still have a firewall. Take a look at the documentation and look for the keyword "transparent firewall". With a transparent firewall you bridge the LAN to the WAN –> you have the same subnet on LAN and WAN (as you have it right now).

A fast test would be to boot from the cd and only select the wan and lan nic. ( Remember a switch or crossover cable between your pfSense box and the test pc ).

Try to run the smp kernel in case you are runnning the uniprocessor kernel atm. If that doesn't help either simply disable acpi (see http://devwiki.pfsense.org/BootOptions how to make the option permanent on bootup).

This feature was realy nice for the ALIX/wrap boards… Until I certain version (I think it was an early pfSense version 1.0x) it worked always perfect. What changed that the firmware update doesn't work anymore? Is this going to be reimplemented later? Sorry, didn't read the upgrade post before. Now I have a second ALIX board where I could make some tests with new software.

Performance will be poor but if the nics work with freebsd they will work with pfSense. However, most (or even al?) usb-nics don't support altq shaping so you will have to live without the trafficshaper.

The install process basically is just itting next, accept, go on, leave me alone, just do it…  ;) Pick the defaults and it will be ok usually.

None that is supported through the webgui at least.

m0n0wall has images for dedicated embedded systems. we don't and we don't want to do that either. our embeddeds are made to be able to run on various sorts of embedded hardware, but you have to configure it. maybe netgate should add a note about the nullmodemcable and offer it as option/bundle for a few bucks more. these cables are cheap and it would save you some shippingcosts if you get it with the unit in one delivery. that's something netgate (or other resellers) have to decide though. just making some suggestions here  :)