Hi there,

The MoBo you're talking about has Realtek RTL-8111G which works with FreeBSD 8.x,
although it is not on the supported hardware list (at least not the G version).

The integrated WiFi controller is AC7260, it is not supported by FreeBSD.

So to answer your question, this motherboard's LAN will work with pfsense, but its WiFi won't.

You might want to check the following links:
http://www.msi.com/product/mb/Z97I_AC.html#hero-overview
https://www.freebsd.org/releases/8.3R/hardware.html

Halea

Thanks for all your input, that really helped me narrowing my decision.  :)

@Golden:

Hi, the days of paying over $200 for a basic setup full of useless and power hungry components are long gone, this can handle your situation at half your expected cost:
https://forum.pfsense.org/index.php?topic=75415.0

Fanless, noiseless, dual lan, wifi, ssd, ram, 17w power consumption, < $200.
Just search for c1037u or 1037u on Aliexpress.

Wow, that's really a nice box.. I think I will get that one.

I will use and old hdd for that and additionally get:
Intel Wireless WiFi Link 4965AGN Mini PCIE Wireless WiFi WLAN Card 300Mbps
Kingston ValueRAM SO-DIMM 8GB, DDR3L-1600

Will be in total around 210 Euro without shipping. Looks great to me considering it's fanless, noiseless and not heavy in energy consumption.

You mean that after using a slightly different modem init script you were able to use it to connect? Can you not just enter that as a custom init script?

Steve

You said 1u or 2u with front ports?

I'm sure its easy to build a 1u machine with rear facing ethernet ports.

Then you could use a 1u front-facing ethernet patch panel to plug into the rear of the cheap 1u machine you make.

so, 2 1u spaces - but cheaper I'd imagine.

http://www.excel-networking.com/catalogue/copper/mounting-hardware/keystone-jack-patch-panel-frames/unloaded-keystone-jack-modular-patch-panel–1u

Ah, I may have misreard your original post. Yes, as Chris said, you can add usb devices to add wifi and 3g. Your choice of USB hardware will be more restricted under pfSense, which is FreeBSD based, than most Linux distros.

What are you planning to use the box for? PfSense is very different to Kali. Perhaps somthing else would be more suitable?

Steve

@Jason:

@ozlecz:

What problem is there if we use 2.1.5?

None, you need at least 2.1.1 for the i354 NICs to work correctly.

Yeah the post that mentioned 2.1.1 was back in April when 2.1.1 was the newest available release. Now of course you want 2.1.5, or whatever the newest stable version is at the time you're reading this.

Re: Airport Extreme: You can run the normal SSID untagged and Apple hard-codes the guest SSID to VLAN 1003 tagged so you can make it do what you need.  If you can stomach needing a config utility to make it work and dealing with Apple's interface, it's a reasonable choice for a simultaneous dual-band .11ac AP for $199.

Thanks for following up.  :)

I had a gaming rig with a TDP of around 300watts between the GPU and CPU, but my power draw at the wall, including the CRT monitor and the CPU and GPU at 100% load, was about 150watts. Intel lists the absolute maximum for their TDPs, which is hard to hit even with synthetic benchmarks. The only real way to reach those TDPs is custom assembly code made specifically to run everything nearest 100% as possible. My brother was testing his computer and was only consuming about 40% of his Intel i7's TDP when running Prime95, loading his CPU to 100%.

AMD on the other hand, lists their TDPs as the average max based on "typical" work loads. You're very likely to reach or near the TDP if you're at 100% load.

As I said the APU will probably suffice at 50Mbps but it won't do VPN at 100Mbps. If you want to be be able to load up the box with as many services as possible your'e going to need something significantly more powerful such as a Rangley based board. The FW-7551 has a fan but there are other fanless cooling solutions available if you can't wait for the Netgate/ESF to start selling the ADI boxes (which seem to be fanless). The FW-7525 for example:
http://www.lannerinc.com/products/x86-network-appliances/desktop/fw-7525
https://forum.pfsense.org/index.php?topic=79024.0
You'd have to find a supplier though.

Steve

Yes I know, but first I need power to be able to achieve my mandatory requirements… Exit APU1C or EdgeMax ERL3 !

For example, if the system requires any stuff in loader.conf.local for it to boot, then that is already provided in the NetGate image. Saves a bunch of messing about at the console, the NetGate firmware version starts first time on the corresponding NetGate-supplied hardware.
Ref for loader.conf.local goodies: https://doc.pfsense.org/index.php/Boot_Troubleshooting

@stephenw10:

User Adrian has that same switch and also had trouble accessing it:
http://forum.pfsense.org/index.php/topic,50903.0.html

Maybe you could ask him. Sounds like it didn't reset correctly.

http://docs.fortinet.com/fswitch/fortiswitch-100-admin-40-mr2.pdf (same switch)

Steve

Apologies to being VERY late to this thread, but here are two tips for configuring the Woven LB4.

The Sun Netra cp3140 is the same switch.  The complete manual can be found by searching for "sun netra cp3140 hardware reference manual".  The link is a string of goop, but this string returns the PDF right on top.

The GUI interface is somewhat helpful as a way to glance at things. Never, no NEVER use the GUI to configure things as it will corrupt the configuration and render the switch in need of a full factory reset (at the very least, the VLAN participation GUI killed it but good). You can use the console or enable SSH (you can generate the keys from the GUI - that did work).

A Sabrent FTDI USB/db9 cable, a blue Cisco rollover cable, minicom on a junky, ducktaped Turion laptop is a stable console for me.

That's only how long we'll resolve any hardware problems under warranty. It'll work indefinitely. At some point, current hardware generations will be obsolete, but with the specs of the hardware we sell today it'll be a number of years down the road.

We don't practice forced obsolescence like a typical commercial firewall company, where you can't upgrade it after 3-5 years without there being any actual technical merit for that in many cases. We'll obsolete 32 bit sooner than later (maybe in 1-3 years), which will effectively EOL some systems, but mostly things that are over a decade old at that point. Everything we sell @ store.pfsense.org is 64 bit.

Thanks, Steve.

i figured the box was overkill – it was available so i figured what the heck,  this should work.

I was also pretty sure the broadcom gigabit nic would be fine,  they come packaged in a majority of dell servers and workstations and are very popular,  I've never had an issue with a broadcom nic in a workstation or server environment so i figured it would be fine to handle my home LAN.      plus, like you mentioned we're only dealing with 125Mbps max downstream bandwidth so if i had a full gig connection or even half that, i would probably go with slightly different network hardware.

thanks again.

http://store.pfsense.org/VK-T40E/

Another option is to build yourself one fast machine with lots of processor cores, speed, ram and NICS.

Then load it with ESXI and run all your computers/servers/routers etc as Virtual Machines.  One box…

thank you stephen

Hardware choices notwithstanding, I would like to comment on your IP scheme.  To me it doesn't make much sense to have 192.168.1,10,30,50 in one location and 192.168.20,40,60 in the other.

It would make more sense to have 192.168.1,10,30,50 in one location and 192.168.70,80,90 in another.  That way you could cover all subnets in the other location from both sides with one route (in OpenVPN, IPsec phase 2, etc.)

Site 1 could reach everything at site 2 with 192.168.64.0/18 and site 2 could reach everything at site 1 with 192.168.0.0/18

Just a thought.

Did an auto detect on all three and they are all working now.

Thanks for the reply.

Have spoke to ISP and they are going to come back to me on the ability to run another cable from the spare port on the Cisco.

I will purchase a small switch to connect WAN and 2 x PF boxes to….only issue I suppose is another single point of failure in the switch but hey ho that is easier replaced than my esxi boxes.

Thanks