Install on Virtual Machine?

[ericmachine]

Hi everyone,

2 weeks back I bought a new server which is installed with the open source Xen and have 2 virtual machines in there.

If possible, I would like to use the same box for pfsense.

My question, can I reuse this server for pfsense? Will there be any impact if using virtual machine?

Or do I need to buy another server (1 processor, 4GB ram, 500GB HDD SATA) dedicated for this pfsense installation?

Do I need a dedicated network card just for pfsense alone?

Below is the specs for my current server:-

• NEW Intel "Romley" platform with dual processor capable in 1U 4-bay rackmountable HPC server system
• 1 x Intel Xeon SIX-Core E5-2620 2.0Ghz processors
• 7.2GT/s Intel QPI speed, 2 QPI Links, 15Mb Intel Smart Cache,
  Intel Turbo Boost 2.0 & Intel Virtualization (VT-x)
• Intel C606 chipset
• Dual QPI Links
• 32GB ECC DDR3 1333Mhz RDIMM memory
• 4 memory channels per CPU
• 1 x 60GB 2.5" SATA3 SSD (for OS/Apps Rapid Startup)
• 2 x 2TB 3.5", 6Gb/s, 7.2K rpm SAS HDDs(SET AS RAID 1)
• Support 4 x 3.5" Hot-swappable Drive Bays
• 2 x 1GbE Intel Gigabit Ethernet LAN ports
• Intel C606 SAS RAID Controller supporting RAID level 0,1 & 10 - Integrated Onboard Graphic Controller with VGA port
• 600W 80PLUS Platinium High-Efficiency PSU

Any help from this community? Thanks in advance.

[heper]

pfsense runs fine in VM.

you do need to realize that the VM will cause a considerable overhead and thus the bandwidth you can push through is reduced.
On esxi this means its hard to get more then 2Gbit/s, on Xen i hear it's better but have no personal experience with it.

you only specified 2 lan ports. Depending on your setup this might or might not be enough. Dedicating network card(s) for pfsense is not a requirement if you have vlan-capable switches.

[ericmachine]

so it's better to get a dedicated box for this?

would the dedicated server specs below sufficient for my network (around 30 macs and 10 linux servers)?

• Intel platform with single-socket quad-core processor in 1U rackmountable server system
• 1 x Intel Xeon Quad-Core E3-1230 3.20Ghz processor
• 5.0GTI, 8Mb Intel Smart Cache, DMI, Hyper-Threading, Intel
  Turbo Boost 2.0, Intel Virtualization (VT-x) & (VT-d) Technology - Intel C202 PCH chipset
• 4Gb ECC DDR3 1333Mhz memory
• 1 x 500Gb 3.5", 6Gb/s, 7.2K rpm SATA Enterprise HDDs
• 2 x 1GbE Intel Ethernet LAN ports
• Integrated Onboard Graphic Controller with VGA port
• Integrated IPMI 2.0 with Dedicated IPMI LAN port with
  remote iKVM
• 250W High Efficent PSU

any help? thanks.

[Metu69salemi]

Question is more like what features you're going to run on it and what is desired throughput

[ericmachine]

firewall, vpn for sure.

but utm, i can't seem to find from the features page http://www.pfsense.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=40&Itemid=43