Ordered replacement for my last Soekris router

I am down to my last (and largest configuration) www.soekris.com net 6501 pfsense router, and just ordered a replacement for it from netgate. I’ve already replaced two other routers in my world (at other locations) with netgate products. The nice thing about them is they are directly supported with pfsense, so it’s just an easy way to go once you’ve decided to run pfsense.

This last one, at the hilltop, has been up now for over 454 days:

 

 

 

 

 

 

The router is (obviously) on a UPS. I’ve had the router for even much longer than that; I’m not entirely sure what made me reboot it over a year ago – probably a software upgrade.

Alas, it is time to replace it, primarily because I want to be able to run the newest versions of pfsense that no longer support 32-bit platforms. This box can run in 64-bit mode, but the board itself lacks one specific feature the generic freeBSD 64-bit build requires. I know I can still run pfsense by taking the stock distribution and wedging in a custom kernel build, but it just seems wiser to replace this box with something newer and fully supported anyway.

I took the easy (albeit expensive-ish) way out and ordered a netgate SG-4860-1U. I use 5 different networks in my configuration (only four made it into the screen capture) and though I could certainly achieve that via “router on a stick” with VLAN trunking and a suitable switch, I prefer to have a router with true multiple NICs on general principles.

Not sure what I will do with the soekris box when the new netgate gear arrives; it makes a great Unix freeBSD sandbox but I really have no use for such a thing. Maybe I can turn it into some ridiculous lego contraption controller someday 🙂


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