4-port NIC recommends, PCI-e X4 or X8
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I would like to put together a router than can handle Gigabit LAN-LAN, and 100+ Mbps WAN-LAN. I'll do a single VPN connection, and use traffic shaping. My internet right now is only 20/2 Mbps, but 50/10 is available. Plus room for expansion is wise as my neighborhood is likely to see further speed increases.
I am trying to spec a 4-port LAN card. The Intel E1G44HTBLK, which is 8250 based, looks to be quite the performer including a direct PCIe 2.0 interface in the chipset, not relying on a PCIe bridge chip. And it is priced appropriately at $340.
Are there more-reasonably-priced alternatives to get me 4 ports and still retain the ability to handle wire-speed traffic within my LAN? I have a RAID server on this network, and can saturate Gb ethernet pretty easily.
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1. I don't believe that NIC will actually work unless you build a driver yourself.
2. The PT cards should work out of the box.
3. Unless you have a reason to push LAN-LAN traffic through pfSense, you're better off just using a switch. -
I was under the impression that the newer Intel cards (E1G44HTBLK) were supported in 2.0 as it was based on FreeBSD 8?
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3. Unless you have a reason to push LAN-LAN traffic through pfSense, you're better off just using a switch.
I would likely apply QoS based on DSCP tags to LAN-LAN as well as WAN-LAN traffic for a mixed voice/data network. Can you be more specific about why I would not want LAN traffic going through pfsense?
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I was under the impression that the newer Intel cards (E1G44HTBLK) were supported in 2.0 as it was based on FreeBSD 8?
The 8.0 (and 8.1/8.2) HCL says 82576 is the newest supported. That might not be accurate though.
3. Unless you have a reason to push LAN-LAN traffic through pfSense, you're better off just using a switch.
I would likely apply QoS based on DSCP tags to LAN-LAN as well as WAN-LAN traffic for a mixed voice/data network. Can you be more specific about why I would not want LAN traffic going through pfsense?
Because any traffic that is LAN-LAN will seriously drag down your system. It takes a LOT of power to push 1000Mbit/s through a box. You're better off using vLANs and an L3 switch to keep your local voice & data traffic separate. Keep the pfSense box out of the way so it only has to deal with LAN-WAN traffic.