That is simplifying the situation somewhat but yes it's basically true. Unless all of your users are simultaneously running bit torrent clients creating many many thousands of connections I wouldn't expect a problem. Even in that extreme situation I wouldn't expect a problem, 2GB is a lot of connection states. My home box, which is running a P4 underclocked to 1.2GHz, can push >250Mbps when doing only firewall and NAT. As soon as you introduce extra services like Squid or Snort the hardware requirements increase significantly. Both of those require significant CPU time to process packets and lots of RAM leaving less for connections. Even so I wouldn't expect you to have any real problems should you decide to run Squid in the future. It looks like those gen 8 microservers have upgradable CPUs anyway. Steve

I've been using one of these for a while with pfsense 2.1 (the NICs aren't supported in 2.0.x), and it's been great. Handles 100 megabit internet service without breaking a sweat. http://www.gigabyte.us/products/product-page.aspx?pid=4444#ov Would be easy enough to add a low-profile NIC to that. -edit- Just found out there's a new version of the motherboard out, with a newer Celeron based on Intel's 22 nm process. http://www.gigabyte.us/products/product-page.aspx?pid=4497

If you used Win32 Disk Imager and you are using FreeDOSBios2.img.gz you will have to unzip the file image file first. Did you do that? You can easily prove that the image was written correctly by reading the CF card in Windows. Steve

@stephenw10: i350 should be fine in 2.1 (which is now imminent). Steve my i350 cards work out of the box with 2.0.3 already Those minicard NICs are awesome, did not know about them. 1x 82574L for $40 in a custom format isn't bad, but $92 for an i350-T2 is a good deal even compared to normal card prices.

@jpsb: I am building a new pfsense on the Intel DN2800MT, and a dual NIC from Jetway (ADMPEIDLA) Intel Gbit Mini PCI Express cards. So how did it go? Is the card (chipset Intel -i350) supported in pfSense?

Yep - I think that one may have been used in one or two builds.  I'm pretty sure its supported. The em(4) driver supports Gigabit Ethernet adapters based on the Intel 82540, 82541ER, 82541PI, 82542, 82543, 82544, 82545, 82546, 82546EB, 82546GB, 82547, 82571, 82572, 82573, and 82574 controller chips: Intel PRO/1000 CT Network Connection (82547) Intel PRO/1000 F Server Adapter (82543) Intel PRO/1000 Gigabit Server Adapter (82542) ***  Intel PRO/1000 GT Desktop Adapter (82541PI)  *** Intel PRO/1000 MF Dual Port Server Adapter (82546) Intel PRO/1000 MF Server Adapter (82545) Intel PRO/1000 MF Server Adapter (LX) (82545) Intel PRO/1000 MT Desktop Adapter (82540) Intel PRO/1000 MT Desktop Adapter (82541) Intel PRO/1000 MT Dual Port Server Adapter (82546) Intel PRO/1000 MT Quad Port Server Adapter (82546EB) Intel PRO/1000 MT Server Adapter (82545) Intel PRO/1000 PF Dual Port Server Adapter (82571) Intel PRO/1000 PF Quad Port Server Adapter (82571) Intel PRO/1000 PF Server Adapter (82572) Intel PRO/1000 PT Desktop Adapter (82572) Intel PRO/1000 PT Dual Port Server Adapter (82571) Intel PRO/1000 PT Quad Port Server Adapter (82571) Intel PRO/1000 PT Server Adapter (82572) Intel PRO/1000 T Desktop Adapter (82544) Intel PRO/1000 T Server Adapter (82543) Intel PRO/1000 XF Server Adapter (82544) Intel PRO/1000 XT Server Adapter (82544)

The earlier Nokia boxes didn't use a standard PC BIOS so the operating system needed code that included specific platform knowledge of interrupt routing. FreeBSD doesn't include such knowledge of Nokia boxes. There are FreeBSD loader variables that can be specified to override interrupt specifications apparently provided by the BIOS but without a fair bit of detailed knowledge of the specific hardware design you could spend many hours trying to guess the correct values. If you want to tinker for a while to see what you can make work, by all means do so. But if you value your time and need to get something working quickly I suggest the Nokia box is not for you.

@stephenw10: Do you mean 5709? If you're running Broadcom NICs in Dell hardware then the first thing you should try is this: http://doc.pfsense.org/index.php/Tuning_and_Troubleshooting_Network_Cards#Broadcom_bce.284.29_Cards Steve Edit: Wrong link. Yes sorry 5709's… Thanks for prompt response and info. I'll review and report back. E

Honestly, it depends on the PSU. Different PSUs are rated differently. If you are looking it for a pfSense system, then I suppose you would have to go with Intel specs on the minimum draw.

@Aluminum: @n0hc: How does this setup look and is there anything that I should change? Intel S1200BTSR LGA 1155 Micro ATX Intel Motherboard - OEM http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813121714 Intel Core i3-3240 Ivy Bridge 3.4GHz LGA 1155 55W Dual-Core Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 2500 BX80637i33240 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116773 Western Digital Scorpio Black WD2500BEKT 250GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 2.5" Internal Notebook Hard Drive http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136279 SeaSonic SS-300ET Bronze 300W ATX12V V2.3 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC Power Supply - OEM http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151086 G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F3-10666CL9D-4GBNQ http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231190 iStarUSA D-213-MATX Black Metal/ Aluminum 2U Rackmount microATX Server Chassis 1 External 5.25" Drive Bays - OEM http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811165213 Total comes to $495 I see you are paying a lot more for a server board (C206) but using regular ram. That cpu also has no aes-ni which you can do cheaper with haswell i3s, not sure if that platform is too new for even 2.1 though. If you do want ECC, there are better supermicro models. To be honest the easiest way to get reliable intel server nics is $25 for a dual port on fleabay and they also come low profile, instead of paying extra for onboard versions. ($75~100 for LP quads) Any chance you live near a microcenter? There are a couple nice cpu+board options, $90 S1155 and S1150 uATX boards with intel nics. (DH77EB w/ 82579V and H87M Pro4 w/ i217V respectively) If haswell works on 2.1 this will get you aes-ni with the same clockspeed: i3 4130 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116946 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157384 Is there a chance that I could get a good NIC on newegg? I live in a pretty remote area, so no microcenter around here. Dont mind spending the money for a intel server nic if that would be much more reliable. Do you have a suggestion on RAM, or just any good server RAM will do?

@stephenw10: @Aluminum: G530 don't use 65W and real world users with power meters know it, that is just intel being intel with market segmentation and putting up an arbitrary catch-all number on the ark site. That's not an arbitrary number, it's the thermal design power. It does not reflect what the actual power consumption might be in any particular application but rather what the maximum power the cooling solution must be able to deal with. Steve I understand the differences between worrying about wall draw and choosing a heatsink very well, and I still think the ark site specs are arbitrary and only loosely based on reality. They are good at binning their chips, but not so good that with nearly identical cores a 2.8 Ghz chip will not exceed 35W of heat output while a 2.6 could require a 55W heatsink. Their manufacturing isn't that inconsistent, if anything its the opposite. A ton of 22nm cores are in people's hands now and the voltage spread is very tight at normal clocks. (north of 4 Ghz, the gap widens a lot and then you start to feel the bin lottery)

stephen you save me some money! I opened your link to that cable on ebay and thought that looks so familiar. A hunt through some draws and a ten mins later I found it and its working great (once I realised had to run as sudo).

I can confirm that this build works with 2.0.3. Onboard NIC works as well. http://www.amazon.com/MI-008-Tower-Black-Chassis-Supply/dp/B001H0BA24/ http://www.amazon.com/Foxconn-H61S-Intel-Mini-Motherboard/dp/B0065SM75M/ http://ark.intel.com/products/53480/ http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004PLWJCC/ http://h18004.www1.hp.com/products/servers/networking/nc360t/

Most Ethernet cards don't require firmware to loaded at each boot. The firmware table referred to in the error is part of some framework for wifi NICs. Steve

update guys; I havn't touched this box in a while, will let you know how it goes as soon as i get the chance.

any news with this driver?

@vbman213: What is generally the best mini itx board for running pfsense. Besides the NICs, what should be my primary focus on capability? Chipset maybe? Honestly, I'm looking into making my own Mars III 1U box. Thanks DQ77KB works fine with 2.0.3, I have two systems using it. +Both nics detected and run with em driver +No video problems using intel gpu, and the vPro KVM does not cause problems. (security check: don't put the red port on WAN or "bad" networks) I bring a long hdmi cable for nearby tvs to check console locally. +USB3 ports on back work for console, they autodetect as 2.0 I think? +AHCI mode works, I use the msata slot for an ssd +Did not have to do anything weird in bios like disabling features or hardware to install Beware though, the firmware on the board is quirky about expansion cards, intel sucks at writing bios for their own boards… Current status with the bios from July 2013: +Anything 82571 based should work, tested pro 1000 PT duals and quads myself -82576 pro 1000 VT quad hangs system during bios load, card works fine on other boards -i350 quad works, but disables the second memory slot (yeah, wtf?) +82574L aka the cheap desktop CT nics should work as one is onboard (don't buy these, single port 82571 are $10 on fleabay and have ECC buffers and other server style features) No idea about: i340? 82572 aka pro 1000 fiber nics, but I think these are nearly same as 82571? Any 10GbE? PS, this board is really hard to find right now, it was very common and around $150 earlier this year Intel claims it is not discontinued but I'm not sure I believe them

Thats great… Because troubleshooting can get long!  haha.

Hmm.  ;) The box can't shutdown correctly because it doesn't have an ATX compliant PSU, it's always on, it has a real power switch. Thus when you try to shutdown it can't so some boxes just halt and others reboot. I'm going to have to test my box here to be sure. Update: As I thought my box here reboots in all cases. Running reboot or halt from then console menu or the webgui or using 'shutdown -r now'. Steve

Ha I need to search more but you're right if they work in physical they should work in virtual and better actually.