New build for 1G speeds

[physwm2501]

I am currently using an Asus RT-AC66U which does a fair job most of the time but can definitely get overwhelmed depending on what is being used on the network.  This runs to a tp-link 16 port switch.

My current internet speed is 1G up and down and I may look at upgrading this to 2.5G so having something that is expandable is ideal.  If I end up starting a business I will probably get the 10G but that sort of equipment is out of my price range at this point.

Currently have anywhere between 10-50 devices on the network at any point, not doing anything too elaborate.

What sort of hardware should I be looking into?  A rackmount solution would be ideal.

[Keljian]

What is your budget?

Of those clients, how many are wireless vs wired?

[physwm2501]

@Keljian:

What is your budget?

Of those clients, how many are wireless vs wired?

Right now I would say from 300-800.  The idea is to get something better then my current router setup for now that I would be able to upgrade later.  So possibly keeping the Enclosure, hdd, nics the same and only upgrading the CPU and ram at a later point.

Currently have 14 devices directly wired and then another 20 over wireless.  I would switch my current router over to an AP once the new router is in place.

[Keljian]

Is upgradable a requirement?

https://store.pfsense.org/SG-4860-1U/ ? (includes support, "just works", low power)

[physwm2501]

It's not a requirement I just enjoy doing these as DIY projects.

[Guest]

It's not a requirement I just enjoy doing these as DIY projects.

Supermicro C2758 board
30/60/120 GB SSD
PicoPSU 160 Watt
M350 case
8 GB RAM

My current internet speed is 1G up and down and I may look at upgrading this to 2.5G so having something that is expandable is ideal.

Intel G3260T, Core i3 or Xeon E3 will do the job for you, perhaps also the Xeon D-1500 platform will do
the job too.

If I end up starting a business I will probably get the 10G but that sort of equipment is out of my price range at this point.

For the LAN or WAN side?

[Jailer]

@BlueKobold:

Supermicro C2758 board
30/60/120 GB SSD
PicoPSU 160 Watt
M350 case
8 GB RAM

Supermicro A1SRi-2758F accepts a direct 12v input. Pico PSU is not needed, just a 12v power brick and an appropriate 4 pin P4 12v adapter.

Other Features
Chassis intrusion detection
Chassis intrusion header
4-pin 12V DC power input or 24-pin ATX Power input

http://www.supermicro.com.tw/products/motherboard/atom/x10/a1sri-2758f.cfm

[mattyd]

That 160W power supply is also supreme overkill unless you're running several power hungry spinning disks.

My 2758 build runs about 15.8-16.2W under my typical usage (basically idle, since it is overkill).  You likely won't see lower than that.

Serve The Home did power benchmarking at different loads, including maxing traffic through all four interfaces.  Their test rig was measured SSD, ram, processor and motherboard:

http://www.servethehome.com/intel-atom-c2550-power-consumption-comparison/

Round up to 40W, add in whatever your cooling needs, and toss in peak spin up draw for your hard drive if it is a spinning disk.  With my SSD-based build, I went with a 60W Seasonic 12V power supply because I believe it is higher quality than the bricks sold with the PicoPSUs.  I've always had good luck with Seasonic power supplies.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=376-000S-00001

I also built it in a Supermicro mini-ITX case and it was a pretty smooth build.  I have a half written post with some pictures lying around that I should finish up this weekend.

[physwm2501]

It's not a requirement I just enjoy doing these as DIY projects.

Supermicro C2758 board
30/60/120 GB SSD
PicoPSU 160 Watt
M350 case
8 GB RAM

This looks like it would be a solid starting point and the platform I've been doing the most research on.

My current internet speed is 1G up and down and I may look at upgrading this to 2.5G so having something that is expandable is ideal.

Intel G3260T, Core i3 or Xeon E3 will do the job for you, perhaps also the Xeon D-1500 platform will do
the job too.

The other option was the D-1500 as it looks like it can handle the possible 10G

If I end up starting a business I will probably get the 10G but that sort of equipment is out of my price range at this point.

For the LAN or WAN side?

This would be for both WAN and LAN side.

[Paint]

@physwm2501:

@BlueKobold:

It's not a requirement I just enjoy doing these as DIY projects.

Supermicro C2758 board
30/60/120 GB SSD
PicoPSU 160 Watt
M350 case
8 GB RAM

This looks like it would be a solid starting point.

My current internet speed is 1G up and down and I may look at upgrading this to 2.5G so having something that is expandable is ideal.

Intel G3260T, Core i3 or Xeon E3 will do the job for you, perhaps also the Xeon D-1500 platform will do
the job too.

If I end up starting a business I will probably get the 10G but that sort of equipment is out of my price range at this point.

For the LAN or WAN side?

This would be for both WAN and LAN side.

my recent build would work well for you - https://forum.pfsense.org/index.php?topic=113610.0

[physwm2501]

@Paint:

@physwm2501:

@BlueKobold:

It's not a requirement I just enjoy doing these as DIY projects.

Supermicro C2758 board
30/60/120 GB SSD
PicoPSU 160 Watt
M350 case
8 GB RAM

This looks like it would be a solid starting point.

My current internet speed is 1G up and down and I may look at upgrading this to 2.5G so having something that is expandable is ideal.

Intel G3260T, Core i3 or Xeon E3 will do the job for you, perhaps also the Xeon D-1500 platform will do
the job too.

If I end up starting a business I will probably get the 10G but that sort of equipment is out of my price range at this point.

For the LAN or WAN side?

This would be for both WAN and LAN side.

my recent build would work well for you - https://forum.pfsense.org/index.php?topic=113610.0

This looks promising

[physwm2501]

@mattyd:

That 160W power supply is also supreme overkill unless you're running several power hungry spinning disks.

My 2758 build runs about 15.8-16.2W under my typical usage (basically idle, since it is overkill).  You likely won't see lower than that.

Serve The Home did power benchmarking at different loads, including maxing traffic through all four interfaces.  Their test rig was measured SSD, ram, processor and motherboard:

http://www.servethehome.com/intel-atom-c2550-power-consumption-comparison/

Round up to 40W, add in whatever your cooling needs, and toss in peak spin up draw for your hard drive if it is a spinning disk.  With my SSD-based build, I went with a 60W Seasonic 12V power supply because I believe it is higher quality than the bricks sold with the PicoPSUs.  I've always had good luck with Seasonic power supplies.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=376-000S-00001

I also built it in a Supermicro mini-ITX case and it was a pretty smooth build.  I have a half written post with some pictures lying around that I should finish up this weekend.

That's good to know.  I will be going with an ssd for this system, the only difference is I'll get a 1U rackmout since I already have 2 other rackmount appliances.

[Paint]

@physwm2501:

@mattyd:

That 160W power supply is also supreme overkill unless you're running several power hungry spinning disks.

My 2758 build runs about 15.8-16.2W under my typical usage (basically idle, since it is overkill).  You likely won't see lower than that.

Serve The Home did power benchmarking at different loads, including maxing traffic through all four interfaces.  Their test rig was measured SSD, ram, processor and motherboard:

http://www.servethehome.com/intel-atom-c2550-power-consumption-comparison/

Round up to 40W, add in whatever your cooling needs, and toss in peak spin up draw for your hard drive if it is a spinning disk.  With my SSD-based build, I went with a 60W Seasonic 12V power supply because I believe it is higher quality than the bricks sold with the PicoPSUs.  I've always had good luck with Seasonic power supplies.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=376-000S-00001

I also built it in a Supermicro mini-ITX case and it was a pretty smooth build.  I have a half written post with some pictures lying around that I should finish up this weekend.

That's good to know.  I will be going with an ssd for this system, the only difference is I'll get a 1U rackmout since I already have 2 other rackmount appliances.

I look forward to seeing your build.  I wish I had enough room for a rack in my apt.

The only thing I would recommend, no matter what system you end up building….. Make sure you use an Intel i350 chipset ethernet card.  The driver,  igb, is very stable and well supported by pfSense. Most of the issues I see with new builds are related to Realtek or Intel desktop (em)  driver issues.

You can get the Chinese version of this card for about 50 bucks,but some will argue that these cards have build quality issues.  Its mainly the luck of the draw, it seems

[physwm2501]

@Paint:

@physwm2501:

@mattyd:

That 160W power supply is also supreme overkill unless you're running several power hungry spinning disks.

My 2758 build runs about 15.8-16.2W under my typical usage (basically idle, since it is overkill).  You likely won't see lower than that.

Serve The Home did power benchmarking at different loads, including maxing traffic through all four interfaces.  Their test rig was measured SSD, ram, processor and motherboard:

http://www.servethehome.com/intel-atom-c2550-power-consumption-comparison/

Round up to 40W, add in whatever your cooling needs, and toss in peak spin up draw for your hard drive if it is a spinning disk.  With my SSD-based build, I went with a 60W Seasonic 12V power supply because I believe it is higher quality than the bricks sold with the PicoPSUs.  I've always had good luck with Seasonic power supplies.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=376-000S-00001

I also built it in a Supermicro mini-ITX case and it was a pretty smooth build.  I have a half written post with some pictures lying around that I should finish up this weekend.

That's good to know.  I will be going with an ssd for this system, the only difference is I'll get a 1U rackmout since I already have 2 other rackmount appliances.

I look forward to seeing your build.  I wish I had enough room for a rack in my apt.

The only thing I would recommend, no matter what system you end up building….. Make sure you use an Intel i350 chipset ethernet card.  The driver,  igb, is very stable and well supported by pfSense. Most of the issues I see with new builds are related to Realtek or Intel desktop (em)  driver issues.

You can get the Chinese version of this card for about 50 bucks,but some will argue that these cards have build quality issues.  Its mainly the luck of the draw, it seems

I'll be sure to use that.  Probably won't get to a build to later this year but I'll post it up once I'm done.

[robi]

@Paint:

The only thing I would recommend, no matter what system you end up building….. Make sure you use an Intel i350 chipset ethernet card.  The driver,  igb, is very stable and well supported by pfSense. Most of the issues I see with new builds are related to Realtek or Intel desktop (em)  driver issues.

Note that igb driver has severe pppoe issues, and it doesn't seem to be fixed any soon.
For 1G pppoe wan, use an intel nic with em driver, not igb. pppoe on igb will give you max 600M.

[Paint]

@robi:

@Paint:

The only thing I would recommend, no matter what system you end up building….. Make sure you use an Intel i350 chipset ethernet card.  The driver,  igb, is very stable and well supported by pfSense. Most of the issues I see with new builds are related to Realtek or Intel desktop (em)  driver issues.

Note that igb driver has severe pppoe issues, and it doesn't seem to be fixed any soon.
For 1G pppoe wan, use an intel nic with em driver, not igb. pppoe on igb will give you max 600M.

Which Intel Chipset is your ethernet card?

I find that the EM driver causes many watchdog timeouts, which causes the device to fail until the machine is rebooted. This is quite common, it seems, from other's experience here and on FreeBSD when interrupts go above 30k per second.

[robi]

It's not chipset issue, it's driver issue. On PPPoE interface packets are only received on one NIC driver queue by the igb driver. This has been discussed many times. It will use only one core of the cpu.
https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-bugs/2015-October/064334.html
Igb drivers are better than em in many aspects, except this. It's worth dropping in an em-based card for the interface dealing with PPPoE (typically WAN).

[Paint]

@robi:

It's not chipset issue, it's driver issue. On PPPoE interface packets are only received on one NIC driver queue by the igb driver. This has been discussed many times. It will use only one core of the cpu.
https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-bugs/2015-October/064334.html

I dont use PPPoE. What I was referring to is the EM driver will fail at high interrupts/load for many retail chipsets until the machine is rebooted. It is related to this error:

https://forum.pfsense.org/index.php?topic=110224.0

All of my testing has been done using a 64-bit machine, so i386 is not the issue.

[robi]

I was just noting this for the one who started this thread. He/She may be using PPPoE, and should know about this issue.

[Paint]

@robi:

I was just noting this for the one who started this thread. He/She may be using PPPoE, and should know about this issue.

Fair enough.  Good information to know!

[physwm2501]

@robi:

I was just noting this for the one who started this thread. He/She may be using PPPoE, and should know about this issue.

this information is appreciated.  My isp doesn't use PPPoE so it seems I'm safe from this issue and should stick with IGP in this particular case.

[whosmatt]

For what it's worth, I'm running six pfsense machines in production and all but one of them use the em driver.  I've never had any issues.  I've always considered it well supported and very stable.

[Paint]

@whosmatt:

For what it's worth, I'm running six pfsense machines in production and all but one of them use the em driver.  I've never had any issues.  I've always considered it well supported and very stable.

What intel ethernet chipset(s)?

I had issues with my onboard 82574 chipsets when pushing 1gig with snort and pfBlockerNG enabled with DNSBL

[whosmatt]

@Paint:

@whosmatt:

For what it's worth, I'm running six pfsense machines in production and all but one of them use the em driver.  I've never had any issues.  I've always considered it well supported and very stable.

What intel ethernet chipset(s)?

I had issues with my onboard 82574 chipsets when pushing 1gig with snort and pfBlockerNG enabled with DNSBL

Most of them are virtual running on ESXi.  The one that is not is using the 82571EB chipset.

Edit:  To clarify, four VMs are using the em driver.  One physical machine is using the em driver with the 82571EB chipset.  The other physical machine uses the bce driver.

[Paint]

@whosmatt:

@Paint:

@whosmatt:

For what it's worth, I'm running six pfsense machines in production and all but one of them use the em driver.  I've never had any issues.  I've always considered it well supported and very stable.

What intel ethernet chipset(s)?

I had issues with my onboard 82574 chipsets when pushing 1gig with snort and pfBlockerNG enabled with DNSBL

Most of them are virtual running on ESXi.  The one that is not is using the 82571EB chipset.

Edit:  To clarify, four VMs are using the em driver.  One physical machine is using the em driver with the 82571EB chipset.  The other physical machine uses the bce driver.

Thanks.  I was going to try the VM route as my research showed that it would fix the issues I was having, but it was easier for me to just upgrade to the i350

[freebsdrules]

If you want to go rackmount, why not pick up a used HP Proliant DL360 G7 (1U) on ebay? You can get a pretty loaded one for around $200 and they're beasts. I have one (way over kill) running pfSense at home and it has 2x Xeon X5650 Procs (hex core, 2.56Ghz for a total of 24 CPUs with HT), 48GB RAM, and 4 built in GB NICs.  I have 72GB 15K SAS HDDs in raid 5. I don't even get close to taxing it.