Re: small form factor router recommendations

On 4/12/24 12:23, Lexi Winter wrote:
> i wrote:
>> i'm looking for an SFF or single-board computer that can run FreeBSD,
>> for routing (FTTC, IPsec, Wireguard) on a home/soho network.

i'm very keen to learn about new vendors in this space too - just a 
couple notes on a few of the vendors mentioned.


> to summarise the various suggestions people made (thanks!):
>
> - Netgate <https://www.netgate.com/appliances>: again fairly high
>    prices, although lower than Protectli, but these seem to be designed
>    specifically to run Netgate's software (pfSense) and i didn't see
>    anything about support for generic FreeBSD.

i think it's worth noting that netgate is moving pfsense off of freebsd 
and onto a linux.  so long term ymmv in terms of paying the premium to 
have BSD support on their hardware unfortunately. i agree they were 
expensive and performance wasn't the best - but i was happy to pay the 
premium to support a freebsd based product.

https://www.netgate.com/blog/pfsense-software-embraces-change-a-strategic-migration-to-the-linux-kernel

>
> - PC Engines <https://pcengines.ch/apu6b4.htm>: i've used these in the
>    past, and was very happy with them, but the CPUs are just too slow for
>    modern routing requirements.

i think they are no longer making boards, or at least x86 based boards:
https://pcengines.ch/eol.htm


hope this helps!

-pete


-- 
Pete Wright
pete@nomadlogic.org