Installing Another OS on SG-3100

[osnetworking]

I purchased a SG-3100 to use as a home router while learning more about open source routing. My plan was to install Debian and begin building the router from the base image. Can anyone point me in the right direction for installing another OS on the SG-3100?

[johnpoz]

WTF? Where did you get the idea that you could install Debian on the sg3100?

If anything pfsense "base" is freebsd not linux.. Are you asking how to compile pfsense? There is really zero reason for you to do that, and if your hear asking about how to install debian on your sg3100..

Your sg3100 will have came with the OS already installed on it... If its not current, ie 2.4.4p2 then sure click the update button..

[Rico]

Dozens of stuff you can learn for your preinstalled pfSense and all it's packages.
For learning Debian install some VM and play with it.

-Rico

[osnetworking]

I got the idea by looking at the specs of the board.

ARM v7 Cortex-A9 @ 1.6 GHz with NEON SIMD and FPU
    8GB eMMC Flash on board
    2GB DDR4

and documentation for the eol RCC product line where it seems trivial to install another OS.

I understand that pfSense is based on FreeBSD and not Linux. I have been running FreeBSD firewalls and routers for over 10 years. I currently have pfSense serving many customer sites and am very happy with it. With that being said, I was hoping to gain some experience with FRR, Strongswan, Kea, etc. I thought the best way to do that was to put them between myself and internet connectivity.

What I do not have any experience with is uboot and when I was presented with it wasn't sure where to turn. I was hoping that someone here had experience with installing another OS on a SG-3100 that could point me in the right direction.

[chrismacmahon]

I'm not aware of anyone going down the path of installing another OS to the SG-3100.

[jahonix]

ADI-engineering (now part of Silicom) is the OEM of the SG-3100/Armada 385 Based CPE and Network Appliance and other hardware offered by Netgate. Even at their site you don't find any hints about what to run on that HW.
Maybe ask over there if ADI/Silicom knows about other OS images for this specific ARM chip with built-in switch.

[osnetworking]

@jahonix Thank you for the lead! I really appreciate it!

[stephenw10]

ARM is very different to x86 in that respect. You won't be able to boot anything that wasn't compiled for that specific board or something very similar to it.
The closest thing to it, I believe, is the Clearfog Pro so you might start with images created for that but I would expect some work required to get most of working, maybe booting at all.

If you are looking for experience porting ARM devices then this could be useful but your time is probably better spent on a different device if you just want to play around with routing. IMO!

Steve

[msf2000]

I would just purchase a Raspberry Pi or another "Odroid" device if you want to install Debian for learning purposes.