Reddit reviews Protectli Vault 2 Port, Firewall Micro Appliance/Mini PC - Intel Dual Core, Barebone

From my experience messing with a dozen different routers I'd suggest anyone that wants an all in one package that does almost anything a person interested in home networking would want to do to get a firewall micro appliance/ or this barebones version if you have spare ram and msata drive around, or can get your own cheap) or going even cheaper and using any old pc laying around (after buying an extra NIC card for it) and putting Sophos XG/UTM9 home edition or Pfsense on it. Both are free. Both are equally amazing in securing a network and doing many other things. differences between the two, though pfsense has improved since this post so maybe take that into consideration. Lots of support online on how to set either of these up. /r/pfsense, youtube has lots of videos for both.

You can absolutely do this with pfSense. If you Google "pfsense openvpn site to site" you'll get a bunch of results -- I just looked at the first one and it looks pretty complete.

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I have exactly this setup between my house and my parents' house so I can do remote backups and family IT stuff. I'm virtualized on my end (proxmox) and running on a tiny appliance like this on the other end.

That is a ton of hardware for firewall duties. If it was my DL360e, I would sell it and get something more reasonable (less noise, heat, etc. to to be the cornerstone of your homelab.

Having said that though, I think you can get by using some jalopy computer or even a new one (I like fanless) to do your firewall work and use the DL or some other box as your virtualization host and be happy.

This is a pricey, but seemingly good example of a dedicated pfsense box:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01KLECNDG/ref=ox_sc_sfl_title_57?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=AZEYJ27R4YB41

A 1950 would work, but it won't be close to being power efficient for pf sense. Unless your electricity is super cheap I'd go for a mini pc with dual nics. Something like this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01KLECNDG/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_OtXUDbH8P83T3

Another option might be buying a beefier server and installing a hypervisor on it and visualizing pfsense and whatever else you wanted.

I ran pfsense for years. It is feature rich and very customizable.

I switched to untangle after pfsense put out this blog post saying they were going require the AES-NI instruction set to upgrade to the next release. Most of the cheap low power atom/celeron stuff that is perfect for a home firewall doesn't have it. Turns out after some community backlash they pulled the requirement.

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I am happy with the switch and for my uses; Home firewall with VPN server and client the learning curve was much shorter and it just seemed to work with much less fuss.

I'm really looking forward to seeing what they may do with the ERL; I've got three of them sitting around unused at this point, including an original plastic-cased unit.

I bought a SG-1000 and liked it so much that I ended up building a full-gigabit-capable box for home using one of these (along with a 32G mSATA SSD and 4G SODIMM) and putting the SG1K into my laptop bag for mobile use.

I built this one up to replace my dead repurposed Dell small-form-factor pc.
Firewall Micro Appliance With 2x Gigabit Intel LAN Ports, Barebone from Amazon
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01KLECNDG/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Hardware Specifications:
Intel® Celeron Dual Core CPU J1800 64 bit, 2.49GHz, 2 MB L2 Cache
2x Intel® 82583V NIC ports (Note that Intel NIC ports are known to cause fewer problems than other vendors due to strong device driver support)
Hardware support for up to 8GB PC-1600 DDR3L RAM in a single SO-DIMM
Hardware support for one mSATA form factor SSD
1x USB 2.0 port
1x x USB 3.0 port
1x RJ-45 COM port
1x VGA port
Power Button LED, Power LED and HDD activity LED VESA mount for mounting to a wall or the back of a monitor
Power supply included with US cord
Runs on approximately 10 Watts under moderate load, 15W max
Optional Wireless card kit is available from Protectli. Card is USB Channel and fits in a designated PCIe form factor slot with USB communications
Pre-drilled holes are in the chassis for WiFi antennas
WiFi kit at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01N9YVN6T
Dimensions are 5.2 x 4.9 x 1.5 inches (134 x 126 x 36 mm)
Weight is 1.25 lbs, (0.57 Kg)
Operating Temperature 14 to 122 degrees Fahrenheit (-10 to 50 degrees Celsius)
All metal enclosure for durability and heat dissipation

Netgate sell official hardware, you can run it on an old PC, or you can buy something like this

https://www.amazon.com/Firewall-Micro-Appliance-Gigabit-Barebone/dp/B01KLECNDG/ref=sr_1_8?crid=4BB2Y7BI055V&keywords=protectli&qid=1554386321&s=gateway&sprefix=protectl%2Caps%2C161&sr=8-8

Personally I run it on small 1u server

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01KLECNDG/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_dp_T2_p7rtzb52ST5DK Just need to add memory.

The SG-2220 from pfSense is more than enough for the VPN throughput you are looking for. Alternatively, you could use something like this and run OPNsense (or pfSense, but it'll stop working on that in a coming update). Even that would be able to give you the 100x40 you are looking for.

Firewall Micro Appliance With 2x Gigabit Intel LAN Ports, Barebone https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01KLECNDG/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_blDuDbMNS8PEW

Needs ram and msata drive, I had an old laptop to pirate those from. Outside of that it's been rock solid, wish I would have gotten one with a other nic or two, but overall no complaints.