Hardware for a region with lot of power outages

trumee

Hello,

I have been using Openwrt based router (Netgear WNDR3700v2) in a region with lot of power outages. The router has served me very well with no issues. Since FreeBSD now has EMMC support which should land in pfsense, i can finally think about replacing the openwrt router. Is there any recommended router which has EMMC support?

Requirements:

Load balanced 2x ADSL 24MBPS lines.
Powerful enough for OpenVPN
USB port for 3g dongle (for failover)

Thanks

Btw: A UPS is not an option, please dont suggest that.

You’ll need a UPS. There are no supported embedded builds anymore. The SG-1000 has an eMMC already, but it doesn’t matter, the system no longer as embedded mode and thus won’t handle power outages as it mounts filesystems in normal mode now.

chpalmer

I just did a build using a 12vdc capable device using a 24vdc to 12vdc regulator (Samlex) with a seriously big battery and charger (24Vdc) and its done us well so far.

But even with the long outages the system has come back up fine.

trumee

@johnkeates:

You’ll need a UPS. There are no supported embedded builds anymore. The SG-1000 has an eMMC already, but it doesn’t matter, the system no longer as embedded mode and thus won’t handle power outages as it mounts filesystems in normal mode now.

Is it not possible to mount the root partition as readonly and send all logs to tmpfs?

@trumee:

@johnkeates:

You’ll need a UPS. There are no supported embedded builds anymore. The SG-1000 has an eMMC already, but it doesn’t matter, the system no longer as embedded mode and thus won’t handle power outages as it mounts filesystems in normal mode now.

Is it not possible to mount the root partition as readonly and send all logs to tmpfs?

Nope. You can probably do it manually, but true embedded mode is gone.

jgiannakas

@trumee:

@johnkeates:

You’ll need a UPS. There are no supported embedded builds anymore. The SG-1000 has an eMMC already, but it doesn’t matter, the system no longer as embedded mode and thus won’t handle power outages as it mounts filesystems in normal mode now.

Is it not possible to mount the root partition as readonly and send all logs to tmpfs?

A decent UPS alongside NUT are your best bets. The UPS will give you a few hours run time and if that fails NUT will safely shut down your device to prevent corruption on the FS. Also running ZFS will give you some more resilience compared to UFS.

If a normal UPS isn’t an option, you might be able to get away with a Raspberry Pi targeting UPS. They often have a few LiPO cells and a serial or USB interface. Since a normal pfSense setup won’t use that much power, it might be suitable for a few minutes of power and a safe shutdown. This only works if you do a setup with DC-in power options.

SammyWoo

That’s what I call fighting City Hall.

occamsrazor

I have lots of power cuts too. Running a Qotom i5 with pfSense and ZFS filesystem (copies=2 setting). Have had frequent hard-power-downs with no issues. Also have an APC UPS and run apcupsd in pfSense.