Weird CPU speed
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Mmm, I guess I'd be reading through the epic length threads there are for those boxes on the serverthehome forums. Seems like people have done a lot of investigation there:
https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/cwwk-topton-nxxx-quad-nic-router.39685/ -
@Octopuss I believe that the machine that I have is identical, and I had similar problems. I was ultimately able to resolve them by loading a modded BIOS that exposed more settings than the one it came loaded with. I believe it was the PL1 setting that made the difference, but I'm not entirely sure. But I would direct you to this thread that I started:
https://forum.netgate.com/topic/186104/topton-n100-reporting-402-mhz -
@TheNarc Thanks, I'll take a look.
But modding a BIOS... I'm not sure about that. But do you think the BIOS isn't bugged then, technically speaking? -
@Octopuss The way I look at, it's no more or less suspect than the BIOSes that come with these boxes. The way I think about it is that large companies (and even small companies) are not buying and using these boxes for business applications, so they do not present as an attractive target in that respect. So I feel that pretty much leaves "botnet nodes" as the most likely rationale for someone to compromise them. But there are far easier ways to amass botnet nodes than to make nefarious modifications to the BIOSes of niche devices used by some pfSense home users, then post them in a random forum thread and hope that a few dozen people use them. In my mind, the cost/benefit analysis just doesn't make sense for someone looking to attack/compromise vulnerable devices. But of course you have to come to your own decision.
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@TheNarc I'm pretty confused what are you replying to :D What I was asking was whether you think it's a bug of the BIOS or just the result of certain CPU features not being exposed.
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@Octopuss Oh I thought you were expressing concern with the security of using a modded BIOS. To your question, I wouldn't say that it was a bug in the BIOS that came loaded on the machine, just that it had certain settings hidden that I needed access to in order to get the expected/full speed out of the N100 CPU. And that's the only thing changed in the modded BIOS: expose more settings that were always there, but had been hidden,
