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Your Router Sucks. Build Your Own Instead! (SPONSORED)

SeanLMG

 

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Did you know that you can build your own router that can perform better than off-the-shelf products? It’s easier than you might think to build your own opnSense or pfSense router, and we’ll show you how!

 

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3 minutes ago, cowsgomooo said:

This video was pretty sloppy and poorly articulated 😞

 

Doesn’t even explain why you’d build your own router over buying a nice aftermarket one.

I think they tried too hard not to be a tech quickie... 

Welcome to Linus Drop Tips everyone. 

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We might have some of the worst electricity cost around the world here in Germany, but at least the German company AVM makes pretty damn good routers.

 

 

 

 

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22 minutes ago, cowsgomooo said:

This video was pretty sloppy and poorly articulated 😞

 

Doesn’t even explain why you’d build your own router over buying a nice aftermarket one.

They also used a Ubiquiti AP which needs to be configured via the Unifi Controller software or the app. There is a unofficial plugin for OPNsense for the Unifi Controller, but they do not mention that or the app at all.

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This video is kinda pointless, the people that actually need a full fledged opensense don't need this video... Especially because they don't even really explain why you might want to use it. Would probably have been better if you showed off openwrt, as it still gives your more options that your isp router, without having a full fledged x86 machine running all day...

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I think the use case of this video has been completely blown out of proportion. I'm not defending LTT on this video, but I think they meant for this video to show the possibilities of making your own router rather than a step-by-step in-depth guide.  

Welcome to Linus Drop Tips everyone. 

Spoiler

he drops things

                                                       

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Sure, you could built a giant home router that consumes like 100W+ and requires monitoring and tinkering, or you could get 2 really nice Mesh routers from a brand like Linksys or Ubiquity that consume less than 20W combined and cover the majority of home networks and take 10min to setup. 

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I've been recently looking making a router and was looking at a NanoPi R6S with their version of WRT, 2x 2.5GB Ethernet from the box, and powered by USB-C so going to be much cheaper to run 24/7.

 

Is OpenSense/PFSense a much better solution or is it just the one picked for a quick video?

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Why would i do that?

My router is pretty good...

I have no issues getting the full 1Gb\s with it on Wi-Fi.

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I will suggest after installing OPNsense, I would suggest do a system update and install driver if you are using Realtek NIC, using the old router (default WAN port is set to DHCP). OPNsense website dose not provide the latest install image nor Realtek drivers for some reason.

 

Also, for 2.5Gb or 10Gb users, I think it is much cheaper to use OPNsense as switch, since NICs are way cheaper than a switch.

https://docs.opnsense.org/manual/how-tos/lan_bridge.html

 

One thing is, OPNsense dose not come with UPnP install for security reasons. Install it if you use service like Emby, or BT.

 

Finally, OPNsense is quite CPU heavy, for 1Gb WAN, I would recommend something better than a Intel Celeron. Checking passmark for performance is a good reference.

 

P.S.

If you enjoy a lot of plugins, I would recommend use OpenWRT instead. 

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this seems massively inefficient. not in only power draw, but also the amount of powerpoints you now need.

 

not everyone has a server rack in their basement, so i don't know where you really expect "normal" people to put these where it isn't going to look massively ugly.

🌲🌲🌲

 

 

 

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Only 16-17 watts to run this pfSense box. 😛

 

 

 

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1 hour ago, CerealExperimentsLain said:

Only 16-17 watts to run this pfSense box. 😛

 

 

 

 

Have you considered an even more power efficient solution:
 

https://www.servethehome.com/hp-t620-plus-thin-client-and-firewall-vpn-appliance/

 

 

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LTT should do better.

 

The performance and stability of a router cannot be measured easily without professional tool. There are industry standards like RFC2544 for a reason.

 

You should compare dedicated routers and CPU driven routers by aggregated small packet results. Unless you use modern power hungry CPU, dedicated routers are really hard to beat.

 

If LTT truely wants to be professional reviewer, you guys should consider investing a IXIA optixia XM2 or similar IP performance tester. Dedicated routers exist for good reasons other than power efficiency. From my past testing, most DIY routers can do about 100-300 Kpps, while most consumer grade routers like can do 1-2 Mpps, newer routers like AX86U perform even better.

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9 minutes ago, rcmaehl said:

 

Have you considered an even more power efficient solution:
 

https://www.servethehome.com/hp-t620-plus-thin-client-and-firewall-vpn-appliance/

 

 

So, fun story... The T620 has a mechanical x16 slot but it apparently can't correctly supply the full 75 watts that an x16 slot can provide, even when using a 200 watt power brick like I was.

 

In short, if you try to run RX 460 in a T620, you will keep seeing it reset when starting a 3D load... And the mobo will eventually die...

 

...Anyone wanna buy a slightly used RX 460?

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3 minutes ago, CerealExperimentsLain said:

So, fun story... The T620 has a mechanical x16 slot but it apparently can't correctly supply the full 75 watts that an x16 slot can provide, even when using a 200 watt power brick like I was.

 

In short, if you try to run RX 460 in a T620, you will keep seeing it reset when starting a 3D load... And the mobo will eventually die...

 

...Anyone wanna buy a slightly used RX 460?

I mean, I'm sure I can mod my T620+ to provide the right voltage. How much you asking

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Just now, rcmaehl said:

I mean, I'm sure I can mod my T620+ to provide the right voltage. How much you asking

Uhh... I'm pretty sure the issue would be the necessary amperage not voltage...

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So when I complain about a video, you make a longer one just like it that doesn't address my complaints?

Basically, it's a fine video for the 1% of people who actually need a high speed home network where the store bought routers might not keep up, or who need some kind of advanced logging or advanced firewall stuff.  The problem is that you don't make this clear.  For 99% of people, it's a time consuming project that results in more watts, more physical space, and no noticeable difference in usage.

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4 minutes ago, Thomas A. Fine said:

So when I complain about a video, you make a longer one just like it that doesn't address my complaints?

Basically, it's a fine video for the 1% of people who actually need a high speed home network where the store bought routers might not keep up, or who need some kind of advanced logging or advanced firewall stuff.  The problem is that you don't make this clear.  For 99% of people, it's a time consuming project that results in more watts, more physical space, and no noticeable difference in usage.

I also wrote one questioning this topic:

 

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Just now, CerealExperimentsLain said:

Uhh... I'm pretty sure the issue would be the necessary amperage not voltage...

Phrasing, sorry. But yeah should be able to use a mining riser with external power input instead of HP's riser to fix this.

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4 hours ago, Sorachan said:

There are industry standards like RFC2544 for a reason

 

RFC2544 is great for testing forwarding rates for IMIX, but it also doesn't paint the whole picture. That is why Y.1564 and supplemented by RFC 6349 have proven give closer to "real world" results.

 

4 hours ago, Sorachan said:

You should compare dedicated routers and CPU driven routers by aggregated small packet results. Unless you use modern power hungry CPU, dedicated routers are really hard to beat.

 

To break it down further and to clarify, it also needs to be separated between routing and firewall as there is a large difference in performance between the two. I'd say include switching but at the consumer level, modern switchchips/ASIC are cheap and 99% of the time can do line-rate at 64B. When it comes to DIY, there is a lot in variability to make the results meaningful.

 

Pure routing in hardware vs software is not even a competition unless you begin to throw CPU at it. But as NOS' improve kernel level support along with software and NIC's supporting more HW offloading, the difference in routing performance between dedicated consumer routers and DIY routers is shrinking. However, power/performance still doesn't make it worth it.

 

Now when talking about consumer/DIY routers, they are a combination of routing, switching and firewall. It's not until the mid to upper end of enterprise firewalls where even basic L4 connection tracking can be done in hardware. Consumer/prosumer firewalls will almost always have the CPU involved for conntrack. This results in bringing the performance between consumer "routers" and DIY much closer depending on CPU because you're losing the benefit of HW routing and punting to a much weaker CPU. That said, consumer routers can have the ability to HW offload EST connections, reducing the load on the CPU.

 

While I would like to see the labs run various performance test, in the end I think it's mostly a waste of time. Too many variables, too little of a target audience and I don't have faith the test would be executed or interpreted properly. If the do I would like them to focus on the DIY side of thing and power consumption that way they can demonstrate how wasteful they are for 99% of people. Unless a user is looking at some NGFW features, it makes more sense to just stick with consumer routers. We're talking 10-20w stressed vs a DIY that idles at 40w, let alone has any significant load on it.

 

4 hours ago, Sorachan said:

From my past testing, most DIY routers can do about 100-300 Kpps, while most consumer grade routers like can do 1-2 Mpps, newer routers like AX86U perform even better

Can you clarify on what packet sizes you're testing? Because 1-2Mpps is far beyond consumer grade firewalls and even routers at 1500B.

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The one area where this would be useful for me is for using a multi-WAN connection, because I may actually soon be in a position where I could end up with two seperate connections (a reliable but somewhat slow DSL connection and a fast but unreliable cable connection). But realistically, since none of them is gigabit (the cable connection is 500Mbit), I can just use an OpenWRT box and it should be fine, I hope.

Meanwhile in 2024: Ivy Bridge-E has finally retired from gaming (but is still not dead).

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5 hours ago, mynameisjuan said:

 

RFC2544 is great for testing forwarding rates for IMIX, but it also doesn't paint the whole picture. That is why Y.1564 and supplemented by RFC 6349 have proven give closer to "real world" results.

 

 

To break it down further and to clarify, it also needs to be separated between routing and firewall as there is a large difference in performance between the two. I'd say include switching but at the consumer level, modern switchchips/ASIC are cheap and 99% of the time can do line-rate at 64B. When it comes to DIY, there is a lot in variability to make the results meaningful.

 

Pure routing in hardware vs software is not even a competition unless you begin to throw CPU at it. But as NOS' improve kernel level support along with software and NIC's supporting more HW offloading, the difference in routing performance between dedicated consumer routers and DIY routers is shrinking. However, power/performance still doesn't make it worth it.

 

Now when talking about consumer/DIY routers, they are a combination of routing, switching and firewall. It's not until the mid to upper end of enterprise firewalls where even basic L4 connection tracking can be done in hardware. Consumer/prosumer firewalls will almost always have the CPU involved for conntrack. This results in bringing the performance between consumer "routers" and DIY much closer depending on CPU because you're losing the benefit of HW routing and punting to a much weaker CPU. That said, consumer routers can have the ability to HW offload EST connections, reducing the load on the CPU.

 

While I would like to see the labs run various performance test, in the end I think it's mostly a waste of time. Too many variables, too little of a target audience and I don't have faith the test would be executed or interpreted properly. If the do I would like them to focus on the DIY side of thing and power consumption that way they can demonstrate how wasteful they are for 99% of people. Unless a user is looking at some NGFW features, it makes more sense to just stick with consumer routers. We're talking 10-20w stressed vs a DIY that idles at 40w, let alone has any significant load on it.

 

Can you clarify on what packet sizes you're testing? Because 1-2Mpps is far beyond consumer grade firewalls and even routers at 1500B.

or have a unpredictable  load on it.

cough bot net nas's

 due to day/night/internet connection on bot end.

greeling ref it on one of his videos. with a dns.

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I agree with the other commenters here that this video just didn't make the case for *why* anyone would even want to do this? They kept comparing their router to whatever junk router your ISP gives out. But the kind of people who might be tempted to build their own router aren't going to compare it to their ISP router. 

 

The video should have focused on what advantages of home-brew routers are vs something like a Fritzbox, Ubiquiti, or TP-Link. It could take for granted that anyone interested in the topic has already decided their ISP provided router just won't cut it.

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