Hello Gerbils,
I'm upgrading my home network setup to gigabit speed and while searching for a new gigabit router I've been considering several options. I've used a WRT54GL with Tomato for quite some time and have enjoyed the rock solid performance and the ability to tweak the configuration to suit my needs. In searching for a similarly inexpensive router with wireless N, gigabit LAN, and custom firmware support I found this for 70$, which seems like a good replacement.
But I've been thinking about putting together a more sophisticated solution in order to run something like Smoothwall, Monowall, IPCop, or pfSense. I'd like a small form factor setup but I've been having trouble finding much with enough Ethernet ports. Here's some of what I've found so far...
Supermicro X7SPA-L - Intel Atom Mini ITX board with 2 GigE ports. (Build I'm considering below...)
-Case - Antec ISK 300-150 - $80
-Motherboard - Supermicro X7SPA-L - $200
-RAM - Crucial 2 GB module - $25
-Storage - Kingston 8 GB SSD - $40 (Or appropriate mechanical drive when prices return to normal.
-Gigabit Card - Additional GigE port - $28 (For guest VLAN)
Total $373
MitxPC EKJAD5254LM350 - Complete Intel Atom system with 4 GigE ports - $323
-Normally this costs $270 but I added additional RAM, switched to Intel ethernet over Realtek (I read that it's better, can anyone confirm?), and added a case fan. I'll still need something for storage. Hopefully HDD prices will go back down. With pfSense I could also use a USB drive or a CF card.
Any suggestions are welcome. Anyone built something like this or used any of the operating systems I mentioned? Should I bother with something this complex or just get the Asus router mentioned earlier? Thoughts?