Small/quiet chassis, preferably 1U
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I'm upgrading my old NAS and planning to use my old motherboard/RAM to run pfsense, but since it will be on 24/7 I'd like it to be quiet.
The motherboard is a SuperMicro X7SPA-H (Atom D510) with 2GB RAM. I will be using it with a 60/10mbps connection, upgrading to 100/50 or 100/100 whenever fibre becomes available. The network will also have 3 VLANs, but I don't anticipate needing to route between them, and I'd probably just upgrade to a Layer 3 switch if decide I want to.
I'd like rackmount because I have other rackmount equipment (NAS, switches, etc.). But if it's small I can always just put it on a shelf in the rack - being quiet is more important.
I'll probably want an expansion slot available so I can add an Intel NIC as well.I was looking at SuperMicro's offerings, but since they specialise in server gear I'm not sure if "low noise" means much coming from them.
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Hi,
I had the same problem about what hardware to use. For a lightly loaded network, pfsense could run fine on a P3 class machine, with moderate power consumption, but they are all getting a bit long in the tooth now, and more difficult to find. However, if you are running snort agressively, you really need something like a P4 class machine. Server class machines are nearly all xeon and none that i've seen (Proliant DL140 etc) draw less than 80-100 watts, which is too high and overkill performance wise. Also, 1u rack mount boxes often have only a single pci / pcie slot, which means that you have to find a dual or quad network card if you need wan + >= 2 internal ports.
Current solution is the small form factor ibm thinkcentre P4 machines, which you can find for 10 ukp on fleabay uk on a good day. Am using two of these, originally 3GHz processors, but they are socket 478 and a 1.6GHz P4 cpu is a drop in replacement. That combined with turning the cpu clock down to 399MHz, drops the power consumption from ~90watts to just under 50, which is fine. They have 2 x full height pci slots as well, which gives a bit more flexibility as to what network cards you can use…
Chris
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I already have the motherboard/CPU/RAM as described in the OP. I'm just looking for a quiet chassis/PSU to fit in my rack. I would like to upgrade it (and reuse the chassis) at some later date too, possibly to an Avoton or Rangeley board if/when they're supported by pfsense. Definitely not going to be moving to a P4, far too inefficient and I'm not on a really tight budget. Not to say I want to throw money away - I'm thinking US$100 or so for the chassis/PSU.
I don't mind only 1 expansion slot - I'm using mini-itx so I only have 1 PCI-e slot anyway.
Things like snort will either wait until I upgrade or could be done on another box/VM.
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The Super Micro CSE-502L-200B case for that mobo is very quiet. I have a few systems that use that case and they are all, in my opinion, near silent. The only fan is in the power supply.
I did pick up a CSE-503L-200B, which uses the same power supply, and that one had a very noisy fan for some reason but that is always a possibility with anything that isn't fan-less. I am not using it yet but plan on swapping the power supply before so.
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I hear what you are saying, but the P4 is only inefficient at higher clock speeds. The 1.6GHz P4 + Powerd in pfsense on the minimum setting, brings down the power consumption to under 50watts and still have more than enough power to run snort with a lot of tables selected. Ymmv etc, but if you are running a web server, you really do need snort. The other thing about using an off the shelf box is that they are cheap enough to build a spare or two for the time when the hardware goes down, which it inevitably will at some stage :-)
Anyway, compare that to an older Cisco box like the 515E, which is a P3 machine and draws nearly 50 watts for a fraction of the functionality. No arguement really…
Chris
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The Super Micro CSE-502L-200B case for that mobo is very quiet. I have a few systems that use that case and they are all, in my opinion, near silent. The only fan is in the power supply.
I did pick up a CSE-503L-200B, which uses the same power supply, and that one had a very noisy fan for some reason but that is always a possibility with anything that isn't fan-less. I am not using it yet but plan on swapping the power supply before so.
Thanks, just what I was looking for. I'll go with a SuperMicro case then. Worst case scenario I can always put a PicoPSU in it and use the SuperMicro one for something else, but I'd rather not need to.
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Atom D510 for pfSense only as a pure firewall OR you planning to add Snort, Dans (clamd), etc.. on it as well? If will work great as a pure firewall but if you are thinking of Snort, Dans or any other resource hungry package then I would advise you look at G530 or higher processor. You can still have fanless heat sinks on them and keep your system silent enough.
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It will be a pure firewall. And probably have occasional VPN connections for management if required - so high bandwidth isn't hugely important there.
I'd like to run more packages on it, but I already have the D510 board and don't want to spend too much for now. So I can just wait until I upgrade it for those.
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Cool. You could install Snort on it.. some folks have done it. But don't count much on response and performance on it after the service starts.
Keep off Snort and Dans (clamd) on this and you should be flying.
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For a small fanless (quiet) and reasonably powerful pfSense box, I'd go with a Habey BIS-6634 Intel Atom N2800 Fanless 4 Gigabit Ethernet with Bypass Segment Server/Security/Network Appliance.
