[PLUG] Netgear Closes Support Request Without Response

Tony Schlemmer aschlemm at comcast.net
Mon Nov 28 00:29:09 UTC 2005


On Sunday 27 November 2005 09:25, Rich Shepard wrote:

[snip]

>  I'm rather cramped for room, but I could put a very small box on the
> desk and set it up as a firewall. I suppose that my old Toshiba Portege
> would do the job if it keeps running with the cover closed and an 8-port
> switch and the Fujitsu sitting on it. But, I'd also need another NIC ... a
> 16-bit pcmcia card one. Seems rather inelegant and patched together,
> however. On the other hand, I bought the OpenBSD book thinking that would
> be a very good OS for a firewall.
>
>    You're right about the quality of Netgear and their indifference to any
> one of us as an individual customer. Since my baling wire-and-chewing-gum
> setup works for now, I want to take my time and get a better solution
> installed. You and the others who've contributed to this thread all have
> excellent recommendations. Right now, I have two business priorities that
> take precedence, but I will investigate options and I certainly appreciate
> that each of you who is much more experienced than I with hardware,
> firmware, and software share your knowledge and insight with me.
>
> Rich

Sorry to hear about your Netgear FVS318 problems. I know I have version 1 of 
that hardware and so do a number of other people I know when we were all 
working for the same company and used them for VPN access between home and 
the office. At some point I'd like to replace mine with an OpenBSD firewall 
solution which was something I had for a number of years.  Sometime ago I  
got a USB network adapter for my printer and so I was able to do away with my 
OpenBSD firewall box. My firewall was an 8 year old PC/AT system which 
besides being a firewall was my home's Samba and print server as well.

I really like having a firewall that has no moving parts and I'm considering 
the purchase of a net4801 board from Soekris Engineering which combined with 
a small OpenBSD install could provide me a quiet OpenBSD-based firewall.

http://www.soekris.com/index.htm

I know it will be a bit of work setting up a router like that set up but it 
will be a good learning experience and it will be nice to have a more 
configurable firewall using "pf" over what basic support the Netgear box 
supports. The downside will be that I'll have to use a switch along with the 
Soekris box since it doesn't provide an 8-port switch like the FVS318 
provides.

Tony

-- 
Anthony Schlemmer
aschlemm at comcast.net



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