Is this good enough?

pfs

Hi,

I am planning to use my old Pentium 4 3.2Ghz box with 3 GB of RAM to install pfsense. I will be getting 2 Intel Pro 1000 Gigabit nics.

I read somewhere that the PCI bus might be a bottle neck. If this is so, how do I find out what speed the PCI bus is running at - and what speed should it be? Is there a Windows program that can show me this? ( the box currently has Vista on it)

Is this system fast enough to handle my 25 Mbps internet connection ?

kejianshi

It can work but pentium 4 is reaching my limit of power hungry vs. utility these days.

DeLorean

I have tested pfSense on different older hardware :

Pentium 3 @ 600Mhz / 512Mb Ram / with 2x PCI Realtek Gigabit NIC's
Pentium 4 @ 3.4Ghz / 1Gb Ram/ 2x PCI Realtek Gigabit NIC's
Pentium E2140 @ 1.6Gb / 2Gb Ram/ 2x PCI Realtek Gigabit NIC's
Pentium E2140 @ 1.6Gb / 2Gb Ram/ 2x Pci Express Realtek Gigabit NIC's
Pentium E6550 @ 2.33Gb / 2Gb Ram/ 2x PCI Realtek Gigabit NIC's
Pentium E6550 @ 2.33Gb / 2Gb Ram / 2x Pci Express Realtek Gigabit NIC's

Internet connection is 200Mbps / 12Mbps

Even with the Pentium 3 and PCI NIC's i get a speed of 150Mbps without any problems,
so for your purpose, a 25Mbps it won't be a problem ;)

The only downside is your power consumption that will be easy arround 70a80Watt,
for that reason i have build a more friendly system :

Asrock D1800M (intel Celeron J1800 @ 2.4Ghz)
2Gb DDR3 Ram
2x Pci Express Realtek Gigabit
pfSense 2.2.2 embedded on a USB 3.0 Pen drive

Total power consumption is now arround 19 a 21Watt :)

grtz
DeLorean

heper

@DeLorean:

The only downside is your power consumption that will be easy arround 70a80Watt,
for that reason i have build a more friendly system :

Asrock D1800M (intel Celeron J1800 @ 2.4Ghz)
2Gb DDR3 Ram
2x Pci Express Realtek Gigabit
pfSense 2.2.2 embedded on a USB 3.0 Pen drive

Total power consumption is now arround 19 a 21Watt :)

grtz
DeLorean

i gots a P4@2.40GHz running pfsense and it only uses 35-40W. i was thinking of buying a low power system before, but now the P4 will stay aslong as it lives ….
yes i could save like 30wh ( or around €65 / yr). but by the time it starts paying off there will be systems running on 3w idle. so its pointless (for me)

DeLorean

i gots a P4@2.40GHz running pfsense and it only uses 35-40W.

Is that a Socket 478 cpu ?

Grtz
DeLorean

pfs

Hi Everyone,

Thanks for the replies. Would my setup be powerful enough to run Snort too ?

DeLorean

With your setup it is powerful enough to run all the packages that you like to install.

grtz
DeLorean

Jailer

@pfs:

Hi Everyone,

Thanks for the replies. Would my setup be powerful enough to run Snort too ?

I'm running Snort and pfblockerNG on my pentium 4 2.4D and 1GB of RAM without issue but my connection is quite slow.

heper

@DeLorean:

i gots a P4@2.40GHz running pfsense and it only uses 35-40W.

Is that a Socket 478 cpu ?

Grtz
DeLorean

no clue what the socket is, its an old Fujitsu-siemens pc i found gathering dust, 5yrs ago … i can't run too many packages on it because it only has 256mb of ram and i can't be bothered to waste money on it to buy more :)

tgharold

My SFF refurbished Core2Duo system (Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E8400 @ 3.00GHz) only draws 38-40W idle and 55-65W under load. Best part is that the box only cost about $85. I paid more for the dual-port Intel NIC and the SSD.

I reached the same conclusion as others after pricing out the 10-25W systems. The cost savings per year (at $0.12/kWh) weren't enough to pay for the higher cost of the compact systems.

The other factor is that with the SFF PC only being $85, I'm not as worried if it fails because I can get another. Or even keep a spare on the shelf.