Running PFSense on my Mac Mini through VirtualBox
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Thanks for your reply!
I actually disabled it previously, but it didn't make any difference (restarted the Vm). These tests are made over my Mac Mini, but on the NAS I have experienced the same issues (using VIRTUALIZATION station, which is what QNAP uses, I think it's based on QEMU)
My NAS is a 451+, but I decided to try with my Mac mini because I thought that the hardware wasn't good enough or that the virtual environment wasn't the best, but it seems that is something else.
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This is a screenshot from of top command on pfsense running over VirtualBox. I was download a file at around 60mbps (I have 200mbps). Using all the CPU. It actually got worse now I'm using the Virtuo drives :(
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why don't you try putting esxi on the mini, looks like 6 works on them without anything special..
http://www.virtuallyghetto.com/2015/02/esxi-6-0-works-ootb-for-apple-mac-mini-mac-pro.html
How many nics does this mini have? Are you hairpinning your connection for both wan and lan on the same physical interface?
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hey, thanks for your reply!
Yes, I think that testing ESXI will be my last resource before I think about building a mini-itx PC (as far as I read it ESXI seems to be free with limitations after the 60 days evaluation period, but will have to read more on that).
I have 2 NICs on the Mac Mini, the integrated one and a thunderbolt to ethernet one (Apple original adapter)
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I have also tried all from the Broadcom section (both NICs are broadcom) https://doc.pfsense.org/index.php/Tuning_and_Troubleshooting_Network_Cards but got no luck :(
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Well, I've finally tried ESXI and it seems now I'm getting my 200mbps. Still it seems the CPU usage is a bit high (around 30%) but at least I can use this for now and in the future build a native pc for this!
thanks!
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So why do you consider 30% high, is that what pfsense is reporting or what the host is reporting. What is the mhz being used by the vm showing 30%? Can we see the rrd graph of cpu usage on pfsense. What does your host cpu usage look like?
What is the point of using 0% cpu, just tells me your box is way over powered ;) The advantage of vm's is to use up those unused cycles of boxes that sit there idle most of the time anyway.
My little hp n40l has 6 vms running 24/7/365.. And don't have any issues.. Can fire up multiple more vms to play with etc.. and never maxing out the thing..
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I have updates!
I've installed natively pfSense on the Mac Mini (I thought it was almost impossible and actually it was pretty simple, both LANs recognised and all!).
Now I'm getting around 8% cpu usage when using all my internet with lots of services (snort, squid, ntop, etc). If I do a iperf to use all my LAN bandwidth I get around only 30% of CPU usage
Regarding VMWare ESXi, It was the host who was reporting around 30% of usage when for 200mbps
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So…. how DID you get it running natively?
I'm anxious to find out because there is little to no information on doing this on a mac machine. I have a old mac Mini that I would love to run this on natively. There's no point to wasting resources on a VM if it's not necessary.
Any additional info you can provide is much appreciated.
Tom
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I just booted directly from an USB installer and everything went smoothly. My Mac mini is from 2012, if you have an older one might be different!
