Getting ready for Google Fiber
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So, This is a bit of a "what if" post, but I can hardly contain my excitement that San Diego is now on the Google Fiber radar. I recently replaced my stalwart Neoware CA10 with a little ITX box running an AMD Sempron 2650, 4GB RAM, and an HP NC360T Intel chipset PCI-e dual NIC.
If anyone has experience with this level of hardware on a 1Gbps WAN connection, how does it do? I realize I could swap out my WAN connection with the onboard Realtek and then take one of the Intel ports and make a fake WAN and test that way… but just curious if anyone out there has similar hardware and a really fast connection.
My best guess is that it will come as close as 1Gbps hardware can to pushing the full theoretical throughput with regular (non crypto) use.
Anyone?
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I run pfsense on an old Athlon II X2 235e with 2gb RAM, Intel Dual Nic. Internet is fibre, symmetrical Gbit. Does the job, I get full bandwidth (around 950Mbit with speedtest). Not sure how a Sempron compares to that, but the CPUs should be quite close in terms of performance. Should be fine…
Not running any packages though...
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If anyone has experience with this level of hardware on a 1Gbps WAN connection, how does it do?
Dual Core CPU @1,45GHz is in my eyes similar to the Dual Core CPU @1,2GHz from the PC Engines APU board.
So in my eyes nice try but no way. Perhaps you would be running with 300/200 MBit/s in real life.My best guess is that it will come as close as 1Gbps hardware can to pushing the full
theoretical throughput with regular (non crypto) use.No chance for you to reach it, forget it please.
I run pfsense on an old Athlon II X2 235e with 2gb RAM,
You are running pfSense @2,7GHz and over 2GHz is recommended for 1 GBit/s throughput.
The SG units from the pfSense store are sorted with 3 miniPCIe slots & 1 SIM slot
capable to hold mSATA, WiFi and modem cards sorted with 2 GB up to 8 GB RAM.Here are named some set up that will be able to reach with ease the 1 GBit/s with some headroom upstairs.
pfSense Store
The SG-2440, SG-4860 or SG-8860 would do the job for all your needs with less or more headroom
for any other kind of packets, services, functions or options coming on top.Budget hardware:
Intel Celeron G3260T @3,2GHz
mini ITX board with Intel NICs (i210/i217)
Intel Dual or Quad Port server grade NIC
2 GB - 8 GB RAMMid ranged hardware:
Jetway N2930 with 4 Intel GB LAN Ports with 2 miniPCIe & SIM slots
Jetway N2930 with 5 Intel GB LAN Ports with 2 miniPCIe slotsReally fast hardware:
Supermicro mini ITX board with C2358, C2558 or C2758 SoC
up to 64 GB ECC RAM
1 x PCIe x8 slot
M350 mini ITX case
Supermicro SC101i mini ITX case -
I can always drop in an Athlon 5350 (quad core, 2.05GHz). The motherboard, thankfully, is socketed.
Thanks for the input.
Matt
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I can always drop in an Athlon 5350 (quad core, 2.05GHz). The motherboard, thankfully, is socketed.
This would be a really good choice try it out and test it out.
~2,0GHz and multicore CPU is capable to route 1 GBit/s. And the CPU comes with AES-NI
you could have also a better VPN throughput for sure.If you want to buy a Intel NIC, so perhaps you would be looking for a used one, Dual or Quad Port
Intel server adapter NIC that is able to get for something around ~$50 or $60.
It would be the best option for you as I see it right. -
@BlueKobold:
If you want to buy a Intel NIC, so perhaps you would be looking for a used one, Dual or Quad Port
Intel server adapter NIC that is able to get for something around ~$50 or $60.
It would be the best option for you as I see it right.I have a dual NIC with Intel 82571EB chipset. It's pretty old, but still PCI-e server class hardware. That gonna cut it?
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The Nic is rarely the bottleneck. You could run a consumer Nic and still be good for gigabit. The server class hardware can cope with higher demand but you are unlikely to tax it at home.
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"Selection of network cards (NICs) is often the single most important performance factor in your setup. Inexpensive NICs can saturate your CPU with interrupt handling, causing missed packets and your CPU to be the bottleneck. A quality NIC can substantially increase system throughput. When using pfSense software to protect your wireless network or segment multiple LAN segments, throughput between interfaces becomes more important than throughput to the WAN interface(s).
NICs based on Intel chipsets tend to be the best performing and most reliable when used with pfSense software. We therefore strongly recommend purchasing Intel cards, or systems with built-in Intel NICs up to 1Gbps. Above 1Gbps, other factors, and other NIC vendors dominate performance."
That didnt came form my authory, it was extracted from:
https://www.pfsense.org/hardware/index.html#sizing
So be carefull with NIC selection :o