From owner-freebsd-questions Wed Oct 2 13:29:24 2002 Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 81A9837B401 for ; Wed, 2 Oct 2002 13:29:23 -0700 (PDT) Received: from cactus.fi.uba.ar (cactus.fi.uba.ar [157.92.49.108]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 523F743E3B for ; Wed, 2 Oct 2002 13:29:22 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from fgleiser@cactus.fi.uba.ar) Received: from cactus.fi.uba.ar (cactus.fi.uba.ar [157.92.49.108]) by cactus.fi.uba.ar (8.12.3/8.12.3) with ESMTP id g92KQpt7078518; Wed, 2 Oct 2002 17:26:56 -0300 (ART) (envelope-from fgleiser@cactus.fi.uba.ar) Date: Wed, 2 Oct 2002 17:26:50 -0300 (ART) From: Fernando Gleiser To: James Earl Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: advise on gateway-setup In-Reply-To: <20021002122555.3b9bc77c.james@icionline.ca> Message-ID: <20021002171038.O81915-100000@cactus.fi.uba.ar> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-Spam-Status: No, hits=-3.4 required=5.0 tests=IN_REP_TO version=2.31 Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG On Wed, 2 Oct 2002, James Earl wrote: > > I'm in a similar position, but on a smaller scale. I'm trying to figure > out where these Switched Gateway/Routers/Firewall/VPN devices that are > coming on the market fit in, and where it is better to use our favorite > FreeBSD machine to do the work? Would I be wrong in assuming these little > hardware devices are faster at the job than a FreeBSD machine? In my opinion, unless a) you have a corporate policy which says what to deploy or b) you have a very large scale project which needs "Big Iron" or c) you need dedicated hardware/software only available for the "hardware solution" (ie EIGRP, or some very specialized WAN card) there is no reason to install a dedicated "hardware solution" instead of a BSD box. They may be atractive in the beginning, but you need to factor the costs and availability of support, software licences/updates, replacement parts and the like. Have you ever asked how much an extra 100BT card for a Cisco costs? :) One of the main advantages of the BSD/Linux solution is the hardware availability. If a NIC blows, you can get another one in less than one hour for less than $80. You don't need a dedicated (Cisco|Nokia|whoever) hardware. Fer > > James > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message