lazydawg
06-05-2001, 02:29 PM
So whats an old PC to do? I've been holding onto an old Pentium 90 for a while now. Last year I had a thought to make it useful again. I figured when I got DSL/Cable I would use it as a firewall/NAT router (possible running Linux). I figured while old its still a fairly good machine (P-90, 128MB 9GB HDD).
So fast forward to today. Now I notice that several companies (linksys, netgear...) are starting to offer home user DSL/Cable routers for cheap (< $200). So in one sense a 4 port router would provide everything I wanted from my old PC. I'd get the NAT on the router (plus HW firewall) and a switch to hook up 4 PC's (more than I have now). However I'd still need something like ZoneAlarm on all PC's for full protection, and since I want to have more than 4 ports available, an extra switch will still be needed. Also new PC's wouldn't be automatically protected.
So when I get to doing this next year who knows what will be available.
So is it just me... Am I crazy? It seems to me that my old P-90 has to have way more processing power than a $200 router does. Is there SW out there that will let me use a PC (with a second NIC of course) to take in a DSL/cable line, place a real firewall on it (incoming and outgoing like ZoneAlarm), and then using NAT get the full 254 addresses for my own "internal" domain? Should I just make a print/backup server out of the P-90 and go with the HW router and ZA on each machine?
Thanks
Lazydawg
So fast forward to today. Now I notice that several companies (linksys, netgear...) are starting to offer home user DSL/Cable routers for cheap (< $200). So in one sense a 4 port router would provide everything I wanted from my old PC. I'd get the NAT on the router (plus HW firewall) and a switch to hook up 4 PC's (more than I have now). However I'd still need something like ZoneAlarm on all PC's for full protection, and since I want to have more than 4 ports available, an extra switch will still be needed. Also new PC's wouldn't be automatically protected.
So when I get to doing this next year who knows what will be available.
So is it just me... Am I crazy? It seems to me that my old P-90 has to have way more processing power than a $200 router does. Is there SW out there that will let me use a PC (with a second NIC of course) to take in a DSL/cable line, place a real firewall on it (incoming and outgoing like ZoneAlarm), and then using NAT get the full 254 addresses for my own "internal" domain? Should I just make a print/backup server out of the P-90 and go with the HW router and ZA on each machine?
Thanks
Lazydawg