[NTLUG:Discuss] OT- What DSL router do you recommend?

[Tim Riker]

Wayne Dahl wrote:
> It's interesting that you mention this Rick.  I had been having thoughts
> about converting an old PC I have into a firewall because I have an
> inherent mistrust of NAT firewalls when it's possible that someone
> inside the private network (my wife) can and has downloaded virii on the
> M$ portion of the network.  The problem is, you never know what might
> get downloaded that might start sending from within your
> network...so...I'd thought about setting up something a little stronger
> and more reliable anyway.

Many home office routers are 66mhz coldfire systems. That's like a 
286-66 if such a thing existed.

So it can be done on very small hardware (TuxScreen anyone?) but the 
more hardware you put there the more things it can do. I'm using a 30mhz 
K6 and I have web, mail, ssh, etc all on it as well as running ipmasq, 
DNS, dhcp server, etc.

Debian is a good choice here, cause it's so easy to update, even to new 
releases. It also installs in much less space that most distros. And 
unlike gentoo, your slower CPU will do just fine.

The custom router solutions are worth looking at if disk space is real 
tight or you have no need to run the other services on the box.

I figure why have a router and a Linux server both on all the time? ;-)

-- 
Tim Riker - http://rikers.org/ - TimR at Debian.org
former Lineo CTO - Tim at Lineo.com - http://www.Lineo.com/
BZFlag maintainer - http://BZFlag.org/ - for fun!