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How to turn anything into a router

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Re: How to turn anything into a router

#21

Post by JohnFen »

Tostino wrote: post #15
JohnFen wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're tech-savvy and building your own router, you can add those advanced aspects in if you want them. I'd be willing to bet, though, that the overwhelming majority of people who use consumer routers aren't doing anything remotely advanced. A how-to that covers the majority of use cases is valuable even when it excludes advanced use cases.

There are a whole lot of normal people using mesh networking Wi-Fi routers. Honestly, most of the least technical people that I know are all using mesh networks because their houses require it.

Certainly. But it's still a minority use case.

Perhaps someone else will (or did) write up a how-to for support mesh networking in your homebrew router.

Re: How to turn anything into a router

#22

Post by estimator7292 »

louwrentius wrote: post #20
icedchai wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but some folks are wary of using the same physical port for external and internal traffic. Fears of "VLAN hopping" remain, even if unfounded. Also, you'll hit a performance wall since you are sharing a single gigabit port between external and internal traffic. Obviously may not be an issue for many, but if you have gigabit fiber...

I have gigabit fiber and none of this is an issue. VLAN hopping is only possible due to misconfiguration. I'd like to be proven otherwise if that's not the case. VLANs are used EVERYWHERE where it matters. And no, the single port is absolutely not a bottleneck because the port is full-duplex.

What happens if one node on your network is downloading at 1Gbit and another is uploading at 1Gbit?

Both get 500Mbit.

Bottleneck.

Re: How to turn anything into a router

#23

Post by globular-toast »

louwrentius wrote: post #3

A router only really needs one network interface. Any computer with a single network interface, maybe even an (old) laptop, can be used. Anything x86 from at least the last 10 years is energy efficient and fast enough to route at gigabit speed. If you don't care about energy usage, any x86-based computer from the last 20 years is fast enough. The magic trick is to use VLANs, which require switches that support VLANs,…

Pretty sure switches that support VLANs are more expensive than a NIC. I think even a 4 port GigE Intel NIC can be had for less.

But you might want VLANs anyway, so it's an interesting thing to consider.

Re: How to turn anything into a router

#24

Post by Ir0nMan »

A fun project that results in a unique and stylish router is repurposing a Mac Pro Trashcan. They can be picked up for a few hundred dollars, offer dual 1GbE Intel NICs that work natively on Linux, and have plenty of CPU and RAM overhead. Throw OPNsense on there and you’re off to the races.

Re: How to turn anything into a router

#25

Post by louwrentius »

binaryturtle wrote: post #17
louwrentius wrote: post #3

A router only really needs one network interface. Any computer with a single network interface, maybe even an (old) laptop, can be used. Anything x86 from at least the last 10 years is energy efficient and fast enough to route at gigabit speed. If you don't care about energy usage, any x86-based computer from the last 20 years is fast enough. The magic trick is to use VLANs, which require switches that support VLANs,…

Sounds interesting. I always wanted to use a Raspberry PI as router (to have one as backup in case the OpenWRT Linksys goes down), but couldn't wrap my head around properly how to overcome the single network port (I think the usual recommendation is to use an extra USB network card/adapter). Can you elaborate more about this VLAN stuff (you would put your modem, your router, and all your machines on the switch... and…

I've created a blog post about this: https://louwrentius.com/raspberry-pi-as-a-router-using-a-sin...

Re: How to turn anything into a router

#26

Post by estimator7292 »

ata_aman wrote: post #10
louwrentius wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not that I know of, why would that happen?

Wouldn’t all traffic be routed through the OS/processor on board?

You'd be shocked to find out how old and weak the CPU in your current router is. Typically they're on par with low end desktop CPUs from 10-15 years ago.

Re: How to turn anything into a router

#27

Post by EvanAnderson »

louwrentius wrote: post #3

A router only really needs one network interface. Any computer with a single network interface, maybe even an (old) laptop, can be used. Anything x86 from at least the last 10 years is energy efficient and fast enough to route at gigabit speed. If you don't care about energy usage, any x86-based computer from the last 20 years is fast enough. The magic trick is to use VLANs, which require switches that support VLANs,…

It only needs one port, but for most simple networks two ports on the router means less configuration.

The "router on a stick" paradigm using VLANs to a share a single physical port is perfectly valid. You're creating a "now you have two problems" scenario in which you need a VLAN-capable switch and have VLAN configuration to make.

I typically like the ISP router on a dedicated router port to make monitoring the physical link and/or cycling the physical link easier.

Unless your ISP is >1Gbps adding a second port to most devices is as easy as adding a USB NIC.

Re: How to turn anything into a router

#28

Post by icedchai »

louwrentius wrote: post #20
icedchai wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but some folks are wary of using the same physical port for external and internal traffic. Fears of "VLAN hopping" remain, even if unfounded. Also, you'll hit a performance wall since you are sharing a single gigabit port between external and internal traffic. Obviously may not be an issue for many, but if you have gigabit fiber...

I have gigabit fiber and none of this is an issue. VLAN hopping is only possible due to misconfiguration. I'd like to be proven otherwise if that's not the case. VLANs are used EVERYWHERE where it matters. And no, the single port is absolutely not a bottleneck because the port is full-duplex.

I agree VLAN hopping is not possible without misconfiguration but it still is a "concern" for some. I also make extensive use of VLANs on my home network.

If you're trying to push close to a gigabit up and down simultaneously that single port will become a bottleneck. I agree for most typical use cases it is not a concern.

Re: How to turn anything into a router

#30

Post by smashed »

Lots of "just use X" comments but the article is about showing the bare minimum/how easy the core part of routing actually is.

Also, if you have ever used docker or virtual machines with NAT routing (often the default), you've done exactly the same things.

If you have ever enabled the wifi hotspot on an android phone also, you've done pretty much what the article describes on your phone.

All of these use the same Linux kernel features under the hood. In fact there is a good chance this message traversed more than one Linux soft router to get to your screen.

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