It looks like that Supermicro board you posted is one of the best right now that I could find, alongside possibly one from ASRock (or a future unreleased board micro-ITX board). I also started reading that E3-1200 V4 may be coming out soon, along with new micro-ITX boards for socket 2011 or 1151? Yet who knows when the processors to match will be released either. Who knows if they will be faster then V3 right now though. There are still parts that confuse me now going away from ESXi and towards another piece of software/different CPU&form factor. The most important part now is to understand which is the best setup for running a virtual environment (mind you all, this is in a home and downtime isn't a problem from time to time). Its just a fast internet connection; thus I want to match it with something I can abuse if necessary and not be affected by high PPS networking or high demand either. I see you mentioned that Xen is the best and fastest most likely. Would PVHVM be a way that a VM is created under Xen? Kind of lost here as I have only used ESXi before. Also, the motherboard mentioned from Supermicro says HD4600 while one of the processors I could get says P4600. Would this matter or cause a conflict?

@Phishfry: Quote: "Is the up and down throughput on those fast enough to use as a primary connection?" Kind of subjective. I use my mifi at work and i am happy with it. Mostly CAD stuff so nothing intense. On ATT i see good speed at work. At home i see better speed with T-Mobile. Both locations less than 2 miles from respective tower. So i would say depends on towers and your local LTE coverage. You need both antenna's for max speed. I will PM you with module details….Bought mine from ebay seller "cheapslob" but they need flashing to DIP. Alright I will look for the message, I though you said you had some that were already converted to DIP though?

thanks jason and steve..

For all their cons, they do seem to be nice rugged boxes that work fine as only and you're not going to do constant heavy AES. Regarding HDMI: you could just disable those ports and maybe desolder them. Plug the holes, add SGABIOS via an OpROM loader and do everything using RS-232. The problem with those rugged integrated kits is that there are as far as I know always purpose-built which makes repurposing them for something else either slightly flawed or in need of some hardware hacks. Now, since you are talking about MiFi, I can only assume you are going to be mobile with this thing. The fact that it has a DC power jack makes that pretty easy, as you can basically use any common power source, including batteries. Due to its size and lack of break-off parts (it's pretty much just a brick), it'll probably live quite long as long as you don't take it for a swim.

As said: get rid of the Actiontec as the router. If you want the wireless option still there: do what already has been posted (enable Ethernet, use pfSense as main router), but then connect the Actiontec to the LAN side, disable all its routing, NAT, DHCP etc., essentially putting it in bridge mode, and then it's an AP (which is what you want, you don't need a wireless router, but only a wireless access point).

Overkill for smaller installs, even the 4-core variant. But yes, if you actually can utilize those 10GB interface, it hopefully will be able to keep up. The 8-core variant I'm here is somewhere around the $800-$1,000 price point, no specific dollar amount has been said about the 4-core board complete….though CPU list price is just under $400 less which would put the starting price around $400 (Avoton replacement?? just not atom) without 10GB...add probably an extra $80-100 for the 10GB. I'm waiting for a few vendors to get on-board in Q2/Q3 and offer 1U barebone shallow-depth setups....pretty snazzy.

Very nice. Thanks for the pix. Looks like half mini. I hear an Atheros in your future!!Ar5bhb92 would be nice dual band choice. You could always slip the intel back in if the box fails. https://wikidevi.com/wiki/Atheros_AR5BHB92 Or spring for the top dog: https://wikidevi.com/wiki/Bigfoot_Networks_Killer_Wireless-N_1103

build a pfsense box, use that router with ddwrt or tomato as an AP

Cool - I suspected it was either turned off in bios or broken.  Glad you found it.

UPDATE: Hi all, after deeper investigating with the tech. support of the vendor, he considers to replace the mainboard because of a technical defect. As you can read in several forums, it seems as if there were common issues with this kind of mainboard. Unfortunately, this type of mainboard is currently not available. I will keep you up to date. Regards toshinmac

… but there is a catch.  If the new NIC uses the same driver as the original ports, and if the new card causes reordering because it's detected before the originals, you may need to swap cables around or reassign your interfaces.

OK I see your post with hardware and problems. Just for testing have you considered trying it on an older version of pfSense. This might confirm where the problem is. Maybe then an upgrade install upward. Just a thought.

@Harvy66: This is on my radar: http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151121 Slightly off topic, but that's the PSU I have in my main gaming desktop, and it's a beast.  They get down to $100 now and then on the American side of amazon.

https://forum.pfsense.org/index.php?topic=59555.msg405522#msg405522

Tested it today and it does not work with this card and system. The loader.conf fix or the plug in and let initialize both do not work. If you plug them in before boot, it does light up…but the driver still does not see the second port.

…without bandwidth your Intel's won't buy you anything, though... :-D

Thanks all, after reading this and found the specs too, i full ack. Nice pfS-Weekend

I have a box with the same case, it is using an Thermaltake TR2 430W PSU with 2x80mm fans. Can't think of a better option.

My broadband connection gives 5.2 Mb/s down and 0.8 Mb/s up, ergo this hardware is more than suitable!!! It's difficult to justify spending more. I'm more than happy with the performance of it thus far.