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FCC updates covered list to include foreign-made consumer routers

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Re: FCC updates covered list to include foreign-made consumer routers

#361

Post by sophacles »

Onavo wrote: post #337
tombert wrote: post #334

Seems like now is as good a time as any for people who know how to do this to build their own routers with Pfsense, Opnsense, ClearOS, or one of the many other firewall/router distros out there. You can get an old desktop or laptop that's more than good enough to be a router for basically nothing (or sometimes literally nothing) on Craigslist or Ebay. I suspect pretty much anyone who frequents this forum could probab…

How does the hardware compare to router hardware? Do they have faster switching and network routing?

Consumer routers are just Arm chips running linux, a wifi card, and a network card with a switching chip. I have a little Intel Atom box that i use for my network edge running OPNsense, and it is indistinguishable from any consumer router I've tested it against.

Re: FCC updates covered list to include foreign-made consumer routers

#362

Post by jordand »

shibapuppie wrote: post #343
tombert wrote: post #334

Seems like now is as good a time as any for people who know how to do this to build their own routers with Pfsense, Opnsense, ClearOS, or one of the many other firewall/router distros out there. You can get an old desktop or laptop that's more than good enough to be a router for basically nothing (or sometimes literally nothing) on Craigslist or Ebay. I suspect pretty much anyone who frequents this forum could probab…

I do the same with an old Optiplex and OpenWRT but I want to make clear the power consumption of an x86 box is magnitudes higher than an embedded-ARM box and is something to consider when leaving running 24/7. If you were to use a NUC or NUC-like form factor, power may be less of an issue.

Yeah I've investigated this before and found as well those old Intel dual/quad 10GbE PCI-E cards have quite a high idle power consumption just on their own

Re: FCC updates covered list to include foreign-made consumer routers

#363

Post by lionkor »

robolange wrote: post #331

How do they even think they can enforce the firmware provision? Erect a great firewall? Fine me, the American user, for downloading a firmware update?

> Erect a great firewall

Yes and nobody would do anything to stop it, really :(

Re: FCC updates covered list to include foreign-made consumer routers

#364

Post by estimator7292 »

jzkdroid wrote: post #324

I just bought a new router 6 months ago to support wifi 7. Hopefully manufacturers will be willing to jump through the hoops for long term support. Don't want to Flash OpenWrt.

"I sure hope corporations will keep on capitulating and eroding everyone's freedom because I don't want to think for myself"

Very enlightened and useful comment, thank you for your participation.

Re: FCC updates covered list to include foreign-made consumer routers

#365

Post by sonar_un »

cheriot wrote: post #340

Can't wait to see the price of the first US made home router. We [USA] really need a formal designation of trusted supply chain partners. Would improve security and make a useful bargaining chip.

No one would trust a US made router for fears of backdoors. Even if they did manage to make one, the market would be minuscule for it.

Re: FCC updates covered list to include foreign-made consumer routers

#367

Post by dryarzeg »

vkou wrote: post #336
dryarzeg wrote: post #325

(reposting this comment from the other thread which discusses the same topic, I'm sorry for any trouble that may cause) From one side, that sure... does have some point. Well, I mean, one could potentially install some kind of a backdoor on the networking hardware they produce, and if it's state-controlled, then it could potentially be a threat. From the other side, though... That's crazy. Maybe I'm missing something…

You are missing something. Trump is open for business, and will happily give you an exemption in exchange for a large sum of cash.

Will he do this for Chinese manufacturers? I'm not sure, but I think they have a decent market share. If this is true, then, I guess, there will still be some missing supply, at least in the short term.

Now, that's not even the main problem. Imagine if someone did something like this with RAM or NAND. Again, maybe I'm stupid, but this sets a precedent. It's not currently possible to move RAM manufacturing (fully satisfying the demand) to the USA, though, so I doubt anyone sane would try to do so.

Re: FCC updates covered list to include foreign-made consumer routers

#368

Post by tombert »

shibapuppie wrote: post #343
tombert wrote: post #334

Seems like now is as good a time as any for people who know how to do this to build their own routers with Pfsense, Opnsense, ClearOS, or one of the many other firewall/router distros out there. You can get an old desktop or laptop that's more than good enough to be a router for basically nothing (or sometimes literally nothing) on Craigslist or Ebay. I suspect pretty much anyone who frequents this forum could probab…

I do the same with an old Optiplex and OpenWRT but I want to make clear the power consumption of an x86 box is magnitudes higher than an embedded-ARM box and is something to consider when leaving running 24/7. If you were to use a NUC or NUC-like form factor, power may be less of an issue.

Yeah, I'm using a mini PC with a thunderbolt 10GbE card. According to my Kill-a-watt, most of the time it hovers around 10 watts of power. Not as low as something like a Raspberry Pi but within my pain threshold.

Though that said, even with a regular old desktop, which is what I used before, the power consumption actually didn't get that high. Even with a lot of torrent traffic FROM LINUX ISOS, it generally hovered around 35W of power, and considerably less when it wasn't busy. Maybe I just had a decent power supply in there, not sure, it was literally a desktop that I got for free from a neighbor that was moving.

ETA:

I should clarify, even though the computer itself hovers around 10-15 watts, I do have an external switch and an external access point. The switch hovers between 25-30W, and the access point hovers around 15 watts. This is definitely a fair bit more than you'd get with a consumer router, so adjust for your pain tolerance. You might be able to find lower-power switches if nothing else.

Re: FCC updates covered list to include foreign-made consumer routers

#369

Post by gnarlouse »

Miraste wrote: post #341

This is the same thing they did to drones. It's corruption. It doesn't even make sense from an extreme isolationist point of view, because there's no path to create domestic manufacturing. I'm guessing the rest of this looks like drones, too: FCC approval is given only to American companies that bribe members of the administration, and they raise prices through the roof. The routers are still manufactured overseas an…

At least that checks "death by hobby drone swarm" off my possible apocalypses list

Re: FCC updates covered list to include foreign-made consumer routers

#370

Post by solid_fuel »

cute_boi wrote: post #323

this administration is going nuts day by day. I don't know how people are even tolerating.

Lotta people just stick their heads in the ground and ignore it, exactly like they did with all the warning signs during trump’s last term.
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