[lug] Seeking recommendations on router for SOHO

[rise]

On Wed, 5 Jun 2002, Bear Giles wrote:

> I *know* that there are small boxen that can run Linux or OpenBSD
> yet can be powered by wall warts - there's a small flash disk that
> can hold a basic system.  I even bookmarked a web page offering some
> for ~$300 for embedded openbsd experimentation (IIRC), but the
> browser crashed and I haven't been able to find the page again.

That may be the Soekris Engineering series of network boxen
(http://www.soekris.com) being resold by EmBSD (http://www.embsd.org).
As most anyone who knows me has found out I've got one and think that
they're great fun - 3x10/100 NICs (natsemi), full serial BIOS for remote
admin, PXE netbooting, PCI & CompactPCI slots, CompactFlash slot.  They're
quite possibly overkill for most SOHO use, but I'm quite happily working
on using mine as a combined firewall, NAT, VPN and load balancing for my
home.  If you're interested in checking one out at a BLUG or Hacking
Society meeting drop me a line and I'll make sure I bring it[0].

> That's more than a commodity box, of course, but commodity boxes
> don't allow you to set up snort logging to a remote database.

True, and they're not nearly as fire-and-forget as a a typical SOHO router
(though as cheaper routers become more popular skript kiddy targets that's
changing).

[0] More demand probably means Soren can drop the prices, so I'm happy to
    proselytize.

-- 
Jonathan Conway						      rise at knavery.net
history is paling & my surge protection failed, & so I FRIED
						- Concrete Blonde, "Fried"