[REPORT] pfSense on Silver Peak Unity EdgeConnect EC-S

NC1

I recently got my hands on a Silver Peak Unity EdgeConnect EC-S:

In case the device looks familiar, it's a rebranded Lanner FW-7585A.

Historically, Silver Peak devices were next to impossible to repurpose due to the combination of BIOS passwords, bypasses, and watchdogs, but recently, there were a few successful attempts to dump BIOS and extract passwords, so I tried those passwords. In my case, the password was Cheyenne1; on newer devices, it may be Kilimanjaro1 instead (can you sense a theme yet?).

Out of the box, the device has a Xeon E3-1268L v3 processor, 16 GB RAM, a pair of 480 GB SATA SSDs, and a 2 GB CF card (I believe Silver Peak puts the core OS onto the CF card, while the SSDs hold the bells and whistles). No video output, so serial installer is needed (I am still using the old-style 2.7.2 installer, upgrading to 2.8.* post-install). Networking is all Intel; all controllers are i211, except the rightmost port, which is i217-LM (I suspect it may be able to operate as a LOM port, but I didn't check). Seven i211 controllers are designated igb0 to igb6 left-to-right, the lone i217-LM controller is em0.

To get the device to run pfSense, I did the following:

Open the case (undo two screws in the back, two on the sides, one per side, then the top slides off) and remove the CF card from its holder.
Boot the device (default console speed is 9600 bps), get into the BIOS (BIOS key is Del), and disable the watchdog (Advanced >> Watchdog mode >> Disabled). Change the console speed to 115200 (Advanced >> Serial Port Console Redirection >> Console Redirection Settings >> Bits per second >> 115200).
Boot the device off a USB stick with serial installer (console speed 115200) and do a standard install. Since there were two SSDs on the system, I attempted a mirror install, which went through without a hitch.
Shut down the device, remove the USB stick, and boot it from the SSDs.

That's pretty much it. The device is very cooperative once you have the correct BIOS password... :)