2+ Gigabit Ethernet Ports w/o PCI cards?

[kirbysdl]

Hi, I'm hoping to replace my router machine on my home network, and at the same time start to upgrade everything from 100Base-T to Gigabit ethernet. My connection to the outside world will still be "slow," so all I really need are two Gigabit and one 100Mbit interfaces. I'm trying to make this a small, quiet, RoHS, low-power, reliable, Debian-powered router/firewall machine. It'd be nice if it were cheap, too. What are my options?

Kontron 886LCD-M/mITX(BGA) is a Mini-ITX board with a 4W 800MHz Celeron processor and 3x Intel GigE interfaces. Looks good, but it seems like it only ships from overseas for around $430 shipped. The GigE interfaces talk over PCI, which is a possible bottleneck.

Jetway J7F3-xxx with 3xGigE Daughterboard $250 shipped for an AMD Geode-based system, and a total of 4 interfaces for some redundancy (if one goes bad). At around half the cost of the Kontron system, it seems relatively underpowered, and the GigE interfaces might be severely bottlenecked by the proprietary daughterboard bus. Does anyone have experiences running such a set up?

Just use 10/100 Most traffic I have will be in my internal network, not going to the DMZ, so I arguably don't need a Gig-E capable router. This lets me run boards such as the ALIXes, Soekris boards, and other embedded-type systems.

Do you know of other mobos with onboard Gig-E support and triple interface support? Any recommendations? Thanks!

Edit: the MSI Fuzzy 945GM2 has 3x GigE ports talking over 1x PCIe. Yeay! The only problem is that it isn't available with an ultra low power CPU (which only seem to be available as BGA (soldered) options).

[Hezu]

Do you know of other mobos with onboard Gig-E support and triple interface support? Any recommendations? Thanks!

I assume the dual gigabit offering ATX boards + extra 10/100 card are out of question? Especially as these models seem to aim toward dual video card gaming...

Edit: the MSI Fuzzy 945GM2 has 3x GigE ports talking over 1x PCIe. Yeay! The only problem is that it isn't available with an ultra low power CPU (which only seem to be available as BGA (soldered) options).

MSI has also similar Fuzzy GME965 -model with Socket P, although that propably does not change much as those ultralow power Intel CPU models indeed come in Micro-FCBGA form with a motherboard.

One other option that pops into my mind is some "true" (wireless) router hardware running GNU/Linux (preferably some open source derivate like OpenWRT or FreeWRT), although in quick search I fail to find suitable model which would include gigabit switch...

[kirbysdl]

One other option that pops into my mind is some "true" (wireless) router hardware running GNU/Linux (preferably some open source derivate like OpenWRT or FreeWRT), although in quick search I fail to find suitable model which would include gigabit switch...

Yeah, that is an option, but I'd actually want discrete NICs so I could run them on different subnets.

P.S. The Apple Airport/Time Capsule has a Gig switch on a wireless router, but I doubt you can flash it. =)

[louco73]

I am at the airport in Taipei as I type this and there were quite a few options on display at the Computex show. I grabbed a couple of brochures from some of the booths, as I have an interest in this area. If you want the details drop me a message and I can reply when I unpack the brochures.

I have used a Sumicom case + Intel mobile processor to achieve something similar to what you want, but I had to go PCI for the extra NIC. I run Untangle on it.

Trying to find dual 1000 Mb ports several months ago in Singapore was almost impossible. However, after visiting Computex it seems there are going to be more and more fanless options with various processors. and multiple NIC ports. I'm not sure if an Atom processor has enough grunt to run an Untangle router for home use, but that looks like a viable option in the near future.

Of course whether you can get the devices I saw now and where you live could be a problem .

[kirbysdl]

I am at the airport in Taipei as I type this and there were quite a few options on display at the Computex show. I grabbed a couple of brochures from some of the booths, as I have an interest in this area. If you want the details drop me a message and I can reply when I unpack the brochures.

Ooh, that'd be great. If you have a scanner or some PDFs, please post some pics/details.

I have used a Sumicom case + Intel mobile processor to achieve something similar to what you want, but I had to go PCI for the extra NIC. I run Untangle on it.

Trying to find dual 1000 Mb ports several months ago in Singapore was almost impossible. However, after visiting Computex it seems there are going to be more and more fanless options with various processors. and multiple NIC ports. I'm not sure if an Atom processor has enough grunt to run an Untangle router for home use, but that looks like a viable option in the near future.

My subject line was a little misleading. I'd like a total of 3 interfaces onboard (the Jetway daughterboard counts) but at least two need to be GigE. I'm pretty sensitive to bottlenecks, hence my reluctance towards a board that runs gigE through a PCI bus. Thankfully, the MSI board routes them through a PCIe 1x bus, and I should be able to find a cheap yet capable processor for it.

Regarding the Atom, I thought it was actually pretty capable for non-multimedia tasks. Routing tons of packets should be pretty much all integer ops, so hopefully an Atom can saturate a GigE transfer between two interfaces. Some benchmarks along those lines would be most helpful though... please link if you see any such reports!

Thanks for the info. I don't have to upgrade my router anytime soon, and hopefully in the coming months more of these options will become generally available.

[Irianta]

Edit: the MSI Fuzzy 945GM2 has 3x GigE ports talking over 1x PCIe. Yeay! The only problem is that it isn't available with an ultra low power CPU (which only seem to be available as BGA (soldered) options).

I evaluated this board for a file server project of mine a little while ago. You can get an ultra-low voltage Core Duo processor for it. It's not quite as speedy as Core 2, nor will it support 64-bit operating systems, but it's still much faster than the competition. The processor power consumption should be very, very low at idle. The chipset takes a little more power compared to Epia or Atom counterparts, but that's just a small tradeoff for the extra performance.

Edit: Commell has some nice low-power, multi-interface boards, too. Some of them are even available in the U.S. through a couple of resellers specializing in industrial computers.

[kirbysdl]

I evaluated this board for a file server project of mine a little while ago. You can get an ultra-low voltage Core Duo processor for it.

Where are they actually available for purchase? The wiki page lists them as BGA, or directly-soldered components. The Fuzzy mobo has a socket for the CPU. Are these chips actually in stock anywhere using a pin grid array (for a socket)? Thanks!

(If replying with vendor names is not kosher, please send info via PM.)

[Irianta]

Where are they actually available for purchase? The wiki page lists them as BGA, or directly-soldered components. The Fuzzy mobo has a socket for the CPU. Are these chips actually in stock anywhere using a pin grid array (for a socket)? Thanks!

That's a good question. Back a while I go I froogled the socket-M U2500 processors, and a couple of vendors seemed to have them in stock for around $300 or so. Now I can't find them anymore. Go figure

[Trekmeister]

I have one of the Fuzzy 945GM2 boards sitting on my desk waiting to replace my old router machine. I bought it new from e-bay for 199 usd + 35 usd shipping. Seems the seller has no more of them however.

I managed to find a Celeron 410 (1.46GHz) from a company here in Sweden for 340 SEK shipped (~40 euro or 60 usd). It was a bit of a gamble, I had some difficulties determining if it was socket P or not, I even believe it was advertised as socket M. But I got the intel product code and from the intel site I could determine that it should be the correct one. For reference the product code is BX80538410.

It is fitted with an old Zalman flower, the smaller one with a 92mm fan. Even with the fan off it does not get warm in open air. Still this is pretty much without any load on the CPU.

I have not measured any power draw, but the CPU has a TDP of 27W. The whole system should have a pretty low power draw, since it is running OpenBSD from a single compact flash card. Now if I only could get around to order a good case for it, most likely going to be rack-mounted.

[louco73]

The first brochure I have is from iBASE. They make a series of cases, with a series of motherboards for each case. Their website is http://www.ibase.com.tw. However most of what they have are 2 LAN port configurations.

The 2nd one is from a Acrosser and their Ares fanless series. They had a serious demo of a dust filled, vibrating enclosure, with the computer case inside it. These are tough little guys . They also have some networking appliances on their website with more ports. http://www.acrosser.com

The company of my router is Sumicom: http://www.sumicom.eu

There were many others, but I didn't collect any more brochures, sorry!

[kirbysdl]

Thanks for all the replies. As it stands now, it seems like the Fuzzy GM2 is the best bet for this type of application. It gives 3 onboard Intel Gig-E interfaces, with the possibility of up to 2 more, all on a PCIe bus. However, I'm in no need of upgrading quickly, so I'll keep an eye out for other releases.

[Hezu]

I happened to stumble on news about new Gigabyte motherboards, I think I have to mention one of these: GA-EP45-DQ6 offers four gigabit ethernet ports, although otherwise it perhaps overkill for the router usage (ATX-form factor, dual 16× PCIe slots for CrossFire[X] use, 10 (ten!) SATA ports).