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0 pointse12e11y ago0 comments

Looks like a very nice product (along with most of the other products). It's a little disappointing that they seem to do only the very minimum wrt the GPL:

http://www.mikrotik.com/downloadterms.html

I mean, sure, asking for 45 USD for a CD with the source is technically complying with the GPL -- but it does seem a bit strange in this day and age. Not to mention that for the source code to be useful, one would hope one could build a working routerOS image from it -- and it doesn't appear that the CD will enable a user to build a running image -- and therefore not facilitate changing the product.

But apart from that, my first thought was -- can this thing run BSD -- because pf is quite a bit friendlier than iptables (even if the latter has gotten a lot better lately).

Does anyone know if there are any recommended alternatives to soekris for running a bsd switch/router (preferably running at ~gigabit speeds) ?

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nl11y ago

Lots of PFSense people seem to think the PC Engines APU[1] is ok. Netgate sells a DIY kit[2].

It's only a 3 port system though.

[1] http://www.pcengines.ch/apu.htm

[2] http://store.netgate.com/kit-APU1C4.aspx

gh02t11y ago

Not sure if it can run BSD proper. It should be able to in theory, there's nothing preventing you from flashing your own OS image, but I can't find that anybody has actually done it. There is a facility for virtualization as well. Not sure how desirable it'd be to run on bare metal though, as it uses dedicated hardware for routing that I think is proprietary, so it wouldn't work. If I was going to try it, I'd probably pick up one of their cheaper products first to test it out on (most of the lower end stuff is similar internally).

I'm with you about the GPL though. It's my biggest complaint about it. Apart from the proprietary hardware (which OK, I guess I can forgive it), they definitely seem to be playing it pretty loose with the terms of the GPL.

Pf is indeed nice and it'd be cool to run OpenBSD on it. That said, as I mentioned I really like their configuration tools and they make iptables actually quite easy to configure.

Your best bet for a BSD router is probably to pick up a cheapish computer and put in one of the Intel or HP quad-port ethernet cards and then plug into a dumb switch. They can be had for surprisingly reasonable prices, I saw some on Amazon for ~$80 (the quad-port cards, that is).

jlgaddis11y ago

At home, I replaced my Cisco ASA 5505 (which replaced a Cisco 1811) with a RouterMaxx 1106 [0] running OpenBSD (from CompactFlash), though it's certainly not cheap.

[0]: http://www.maxxwave.com/solutions/security/routermaxx-6-port...

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