Hello world, I've just spec'd up my own pf sense router and I was wondering what you guys think I'm trying to keep it on a small ish budget and I have the power supply and case sorted. I was wondering should I build my own pf-sense router as I need a new one but at any rate these are my current specs.
Mobo:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB...
SSD:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD...
CPU:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP...
RAM:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY...
2x wifi card;
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=NW...
1 x Nic for me:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/HP-NC360T-Dual-Port-Gigabit-N...
So yes if you have experience with pf sense and notice a gaping flaw in my rig or just feel pf sense is a bad idea please say. I want an exceedingly fast router which I can tweak and make sure it's working the way I want it to. At any rate thank you for reading and leave any thoughts below.
-Conor W
First, I think the fact that you are making a pfSense router is awesome.
I don't think you need to buy an SSD. Surely it would make more sense to buy a cheap HDD or even use an old spare you might have? You will get more capacity for caching websites and downloads, and it will be less expensive. The speed of an SSD is probably not necessary for pfSense.
You might be better off finding an old PC to run it on. If you don't have any lying around, maybe someone you know does? I mean you really don't need much horsepower to run this. You could probably find or put together a cheaper system that will still be plenty powerful acting as a router. But I don't at all know how powerful you want it to be.
I do know and love the feeling of buying the parts for a new PC and assembling them, it is still great fun no matter how much or how little the components are worth. I also have an obsession with renewing old computers and making them useful again, which is also a great feeling.
I unfortunately don't have any lying around that don't predate my life. I was thinking ssd more or less because it's 30 pounds, I doubt i'll use the storage and any of it I do use will be lightning quick :). I was also thinking I get more control over how the system turns out. I kinda want it to be powerful enough to stream through any data off a nas I'll be building soon at a very fast rate and keep at a peak my desktop which chomps bandwidth which is why there's a server nic in here and 5 phones / laptops. I was wondering if you know if those wiifi nics will be ok I do kind of want everyone enjoy the speed of this router and not just me :'). Also the joy of new tech is the most amazing thing ever and getting to put one to use like this and get amazing performance is a dream. Thank you for your reply :)
So you won't be able to get full use out of that wireless NIC, pfsense has really poor support for wifi and at best you will get wireless G speeds. Other than that, the dual nic is a great choice, i use that same model constantly for all the servers that i build.
As mclusty has said the SSD will be overkill and especially if you're caching websites and etc on it it will definitely reduce the life of the drive itself, i am not sure how much.
Thank you very much i'll try do a build log and post it up for anyone else who considers doing this for the first time. Cheers for your replies guys :)