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Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Mon Mar 17, 2014 12:36 pm
by Olaf van der Spek
What routers and NAS devices do support stock Linux?
OpenWRT is nice but stock Linux support (Debian for example) would be even nicer.

An inexpensive ITX board with CPU and multiple LAN boards would do the job as well.

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Mon Mar 17, 2014 2:39 pm
by washu
How many network segments do you need? 2 or 3 is pretty easy with cheap ITX boards. Additional ports are better left to a switch.

I use this for my router/webserver/iSCSI target:
http://ca.gigabyte.com/products/product ... x?pid=4497

For just a router it is overkill, it's very fast for how cheap it is and it has two NICs built in. I actually have multiple network segments, but I use VLANs instead of extra NICs. For 2 or 3 (with a cheap PCI card) networks without VLANs it works great. Or you could put a wireless card in the PCI slot.

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2014 3:00 pm
by edh
What sort of usage scenario do you have that needs this kind of router? Might be worth understanding what your needs are first.

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Wed Mar 19, 2014 10:32 am
by Olaf van der Spek
One use case would be as a normal home router, another would be as a router shared by 16 students on a 25/25 line.

A 'normal' computer would work fine but I'd prefer to keep the cost (and complexity and size) down.

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Wed Mar 19, 2014 11:09 am
by washu
Neither of those use cases is particularity demanding. Pretty much anything but the lowest end bottom of the barrel routers would work fine.

Why the Linux requirement? For your use cases the OS is pretty much irrelevant.

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Wed Mar 19, 2014 3:01 pm
by Olaf van der Spek
IMO stock router firmwares generally suck. Stability is bad, feature set is weak, etc.
For example, most routers don't allow you to see who's consuming how much bandwidth.
Most don't support fair bandwidth sharing / scheduling.
And I just like having full control over the software.

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Wed Mar 19, 2014 3:39 pm
by washu
Well that is a bit more than just a basic router then.

Home routers that are unstable are caused by crappy hardware or not enough memory. Neither of those will be solved by a full Linux distro and for memory would likely be worse. The better ones run Linux anyway with the same routing you would be using in a full distro. Some of the better ones have QoS in the stock firmware, again using the same code a full distro would use.

If you want true bandwidth limiting and not just QoS then you will likely need to go full PC, or at least something more powerful than a home router. Linux can do it, but it would be better with FreeBSD or OpenBSD. pfSense is a complete FreeBSD "distro" made specifically for use as a router and has bandwidth limiting.

I fully understand the desire to have full control. I personally run stock FreeBSD on my router, not even pfSense. The C1007UN I suggested before is definitely overkill, but there is not much that is significantly cheaper and still has 2 NICs.

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2014 7:27 am
by Olaf van der Spek
washu wrote:Well that is a bit more than just a basic router then.
Yes, but what's your point?
Home routers that are unstable are caused by crappy hardware or not enough memory.
Are you saying crappy software can't be the cause?

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2014 11:39 am
by washu
Olaf van der Spek wrote: Yes, but what's your point?
My point is that you didn't state your requirements clearly.
Are you saying crappy software can't be the cause?
We are talking about routers that run Linux. OpenWRT vs Debian doesn't matter, it is the same code doing the important routing part and it is all kernel code.

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Wed Jun 18, 2014 12:30 pm
by Pétur
QNAP NAS run a fairly recent linux kernel, I think it is debian derived. I had no problems running various tools and software on them.

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Fri Apr 17, 2015 8:08 am
by Olaf van der Spek
washu wrote:We are talking about routers that run Linux. OpenWRT vs Debian doesn't matter, it is the same code doing the important routing part and it is all kernel code.
Sure, but sometimes it's nice to be able to run a normal / real Linux distro of your choice like Debian that can be updated when YOU want. OpenWRT is (probably) nice, I've finally installed it to give it a try.

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Thu Sep 03, 2015 9:18 am
by sjoukew
I am using dd-wrt, works fine. Using an asus router with 128 mb ram.

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Thu Sep 03, 2015 9:28 am
by Vicotnik
sjoukew wrote:I am using dd-wrt, works fine. Using an asus router with 128 mb ram.
And I use Tomato, but neither is what the OP is looking for.

Re: Routers / NAS with stock Linux support?

Posted: Sat Oct 31, 2015 10:14 am
by Olaf van der Spek
The OP is using OpenWRT on 3 tp-link routers..

DD-WRT doesn't appear to see regular releases.