[sudo-discuss] seeking a low-power computer with 2 or more ethernet ports

[aaronco36]

Jake  <jake at spaz.org> wrote at [1]:

i'm looking for a small low-power computer with at least two ethernet 
ports.  gigabit would be preferred although i wouldn't turn down an older 
one since I have nothing at this point.  I want to make a router for my 
house, to go between the comcast bullshit and my internal network.


How about using a fairly low-cost and low-power assemblage of a Raspberry 
Pi 3 [2] along with one or two extra USB Gigabit Ethernet dongles 
attached, and using an RPi3 distro for a sort of DIY 
"Poorman's"/"Poorperson's"-type router ??  According to David Both's 
'Firewall your home network with a Raspberry Pi' [3], he's successfully 
used an ASIX AX88178 USB Gigabit Ethernet dongle as a second Ethernet 
port.  According to to the Alpine Linux's 'Linux Router with VPN on a 
Raspberry Pi' [4], the Apple USB Ethernet Adapter [5] is recommended as it 
contains a ASIX AX88772 which "has good Linux support".

There is further discussion on the Raspberry Pi Stack Exchange about 
setting up and using such an RPi as a router/firewall, e.g., see [6] and 
[7]

The wifi KRACK attack vulnerability that's infesting WPA-protected 
networks -- e.g., see Marc J's recent Mesh post [8] -- might even make it 
_imperative_ (yes?|no?) to disable the RPi 3's WiFi connectivity for such 
a dual-homed+ router.



> just a raw motherboard would be fine but with a case is fine too.

It's fairly easy to obtain or make a case for an RPi3. It's also 
definitely recommended to use a powered USB hub for powering the Rpi3 
itself as well as the one or two Gigabit Ethernet dongles on this router.

Hope that this helps :-)
-A


References
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[1]https://sudoroom.org/pipermail/sudo-discuss/2017-October/013635.html 
[2]https://www.raspberrypi.org/products/raspberry-pi-3-model-b/ 
[3]https://opensource.com/life/16/3/firewall-your-home-network-raspberry-pi 
[4]https://wiki.alpinelinux.org/wiki/Linux_Router_with_VPN_on_a_Raspberry_Pi 
[5]https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MC704LL/A/apple-usb-ethernet-adapter 
[6]https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/questions/7223/using-the-raspberry-pi-as-a-router 
[7]https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/questions/13860/how-would-raspberry-pi-perform-as-a-router-firewall 
[8]https://sudoroom.org/pipermail/mesh/2017-October/002636.html

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aaronco36 at sdf.org
SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.org