Could you help me decide?

[larrys2006]

I am looking for a hard wired no wi-fi router but I do not know what specs I need to look for, I will get the 50 meg Verizon fios to start and I will run cat 6a to the ont either port. I use bittorent so I will have a lot of simultaneous connections maybe 250 or more and watch vids. I am looking at these units but I do not know what is the most reliable and easiest to configure.



EdgeRouter Lite3

Key features:
3x Gigabit Ethernet interfaces
Dual-core CPU MIPS64, 500MHz
Performance 1000000 pps
Intuitive WEB and CLI management interfaces
Support fro RIP, RIPng, OSPF, OSPFv3, BGP4 routing protocols
IPv6 enabled
VPN IPSec, PPTP, L2TP, OpenVPN

Specifications

Hardware Specifications:

Dimensions 197.52 x 91 x 28 mm
Weight 289.2 g
Power Input 12VDC, 1A Power Adapter (Included)
9 to 24V (Supported Voltage Range)
Button Reset
Processor Dual-Core 500 MHz, MIPS64
with Hardware Acceleration
for Packet Processing
System Memory 512 MB DDR2 RAM
Onboard Flash Storage 2 GB
Certifications CE, FCC, IC
Wall-Mount Yes
Operating Temperature -10 to 45°C (14 to 113°F)
Operating Humidity 90% Non-Condensing
Layer 3 Forwarding Performance
Packet Size: 64 Bytes 1,000,000 pps
Packet Size: 512 Bytes or Larger 3 Gbps (Line Rate)
LEDs Per Port
Serial Console Port Power
Data Ports Speed/Link/Activity
Networking Interfaces
Serial Console Port (1) RJ45 Serial Port
Data Ports (3) 10/100/1000 Ethernet Ports

Software Sepcification
Dimensions 197.52 × 91 × 28 mm
Weight 289,2 g
Power supply 12VDC, 1A - PS included, supported current 9 to 24V
Buttons Reset
Processor Dual-Core 500 MHz, MIPS64 hardware packet processing acceleration
System memory 512 MB DDR2 RAM
Non-volatile Flash memory 2 GB
Certificates CE, FCC, IC
Wall-mount yes
Operational temperature -10 to 45°C
Operational humidity 90% non-condensing
Layer 3 performance
Packet size 64 Bytes 1,000,000 pps
Packet size 512 Bytes or more 3 Gbps (Line Rate)
LEDs Per Port
Serial console port Power
Ethernet ports Speed/Link/Activity
Interfaces
Serial console port (1) RJ45 Serial Port
Ethernet ports (3) 10/100/1000 Ethernet Ports
info




-------------------------
RB850Gx2

The mikrotik RB850Gx2 is a five port Gigabit ethernet router. Comparing to the RB450G, the RB850Gx2 is much faster, with a dual core CPU, yet it still retains the same form factor, and will fit into the same enclosures.

The device is powered by a 533MHz P1023 PPC CPU, and also includes a temperature sensor and voltage monitor.
Product specifications
Details
Product code RB850Gx2
CPU nominal frequency 533 MHz
CPU core count 2
Size of RAM 512 MB
Architecture PowerPC
10/100 Ethernet ports 0
10/100/1000 Ethernet ports 5
MiniPCI slots 0
MiniPCI-e slots 0
Number of USB ports 0
Memory Cards 1
Memory card type microSD
Power Jack 2
802.3af support No
Supported input voltage 8 V - 28 V
PoE out No
PoE in Yes
Voltage Monitor Yes
PCB temperature monitor Yes
CPU temperature monitor Yes
Dimensions 90mm x 115mm
Operating System RouterOS
Operating temperature range -60°C .. +70°C tested
License level 5
Antenna gain DBI No
Current Monitor No
CPU P1023NSN5CFB
Max Power consumption 8W
SFP ports 0
SFP+ ports 0
Number of chains 0
Serial port RS232

 

[joegreat]

I am looking for a hard wired no wi-fi router but I do not know what specs I need to look for, I will get the 50 meg Verizon fios to start and I will run cat 6a to the ont either port. I use bittorent so I will have a lot of simultaneous connections maybe 250 or more and watch vids. I am looking at these units but I do not know what is the most reliable and easiest to configure.

Hi,

For your specs (50 MBits speed and 250 connections), a home router will to the job as well: I suggest the Asus AC68U - where you can disable the WLANs (and remove the antennas) - and you have powerful enough ARM CPU to run in full speed (only 500 MBit or more would require a faster CPU) - on top you can enable WLANs if needed in future.

With kind regards
Joe

 

[System Error Message]

they are both equally difficult to configure. The difference between them is that the ERL uses hardware acceleration (not needed at your speeds) and the other uses software. The ERL if it uses usb storage inside can have problems when updating firmware. Theres no point quoting the router specs because its the inside architecture that counts.

For the RB850gx2 you have 5 ports connected to a switch chip that connects to a CPU whereas in the ERL all ports are CPU connected, For the mikrotik you can unlink one port from the switch and connect it to CPU and gain a maximum of 2Gb/s link (2Gb/s from eth0 to CPU and 2Gb/s from CPU to switch chip). The ERL only has 3 cpu connected ports (3Gb/s maximum theoratical if you make things complicated). Both of them use rules however mikrotik has their own software that works over layer 2, ipv4 and ipv6 so if you misconfigure something and lock yourself out from network you can use mac protocol or ipv6 to connect and make changes instead of having to reset.

Both are 64 bit routers with 512MB of ram and 2 cores at the same frequency. One uses MIPS while the other uses PPC. The ERL is more versatile in that you can install debian packages compiled for the CPU while mikrotik is more of a hardcore router that doesnt let you install other things except the router packages and scripting.

 

[Trip]

Re- the ER-Lite -- you might want to look at the ER-X as well. High core clock speed at 880Mhz, so it's faster for certain things, and no volatile USB flash issues, plus $40 cheaper. Not as fast as the ER-L at line-rate routing over all ports; rather, a bit more of a swiss-army knife device.

Re- MikroTik -- more features out-of-the-box, but you really need some chops and a baseline familiarity with RouterOS vs the slightly easier EdgeOS. Both are very technical, though.

 

[coxhaus]

I like a router which has ACLs, access control lists, because there are always something I need to block on the WAN side. This one feature seems to cut down the number of routers which have it. In the old days before hardware acceleration it was more common. With only 50 meg you probably don't need hardware acceleration so you may be lucky.

 

[System Error Message]

didnt read about the 50Mb/s, at that speed even a single core 32 MIPS based router will keep up with software NAT and firewall and QoS. Both mikrotik routerOS and edgeOS will keep up with as many connections as there is RAM(this would be more than any consumer router). These routers are more technical in a sense that you can make things go horribly wrong if you configure it badly but at the same time you can make things go a lot better because you can tweak them the way you desire. These routers will handle as many users or connections or traffic till the CPU or RAM or port is full.

By default mikrotik has a lot of network features you could make use of and with a little scripting can do more things whereas edgeOS can be used as a normal server though with programs or packages that have been compiled for debian and the MIPS64 architecture. RouterOS has more router features than edgeOS but cannot be used as a server for anything other that it has which you would find has a lot of network related services you can run (such as RADIUS server, hotspot, NTP, DNS,tftp).

For a home user these routers have way more than what you need so go with the router that best fits your needs, be it mikrotik's layer 2 and weird stuff or ubiquiti's versatility in running programs on the router. You could save a lot more and go with the RB750GL or ER-X or similar since you wont need the PPC CPUs unless you intend to use VPN. Ofcourse if you have the budget theres nothing to stop you from going for an edgerouter pro or CCR1072 or both. I have both but the 36 core version of the CCR series and i hate ubiquiti for trying to be user friendly by limiting what you can do but i like that they have some support and that you can run programs on them.

I hate mikrotik because they just dont have any support for the features that make them special but i like that i can use them in a very complicated network such as assigning multiple networks (1 DHCP and the rest static) to a single interface and ubiquiti wont let you do it but on any linux OS you can do that. So for example i have my CCR bonding 2 ports, bridging all ports, running layer 2 filtering on it and also at the same time it acts as a router/proxy on the bridge as well with layer 3 firewall since my ISP blocks NAT so i need to have some systems with full internet access and some with partial at the same time and they need to communicate with each other at the same time on a different IP network all using the same wire. On ubiquiti EdgeOS this configuration is impossible.

 

[Lee Sharp]

You can install m0n0wall, or SmallWall on an old terminal server with an extra nic and have a low power device that will do 45-50 meg easily. For about $40 off eBay. There is even some discussion of this right now on the SmallWall forums. http://www.smallwall.org

 

[larrys2006]

As far as the boards their self not the ez of config what is the better?

 

[Lee Sharp]

Commercial products are tied to the hardware. (In most cases) If you need more power, you have to start over and pay more money. Open Source Products (and software based commercial products) are not tied to the hardware, so if you need a faster nic, you get a faster nic.

Now I am slightly biased. I liked m0n0wall so much that when Manuel canceled it, I forked it. But I have yet to find a product that gets more out of lean hardware then m0n0wall, SmallWall or t1n1wall. I have Atom based systems from http://www.mitxpc.com/products.php?cat=140 doing 900 meg sustained transfers. (Faster then your hard drive...) Now you will get better performance out of a pure router like BSDRP, but that is a pure router, not a firewall with NAT. They even say so here. http://bsdrp.net/documentation/faq

 

[System Error Message]

actually the configurable routers are not tied to hardware. When you switch to new hardware you just migrate your settings and mikrotik has an x86 version. Walls are when you want a UTM. If QoS is what you're after than its from the 3 i suggested earlier.

 

[Lee Sharp]

It is still tied to the hardware, you can just export a config. When you can pull the flash out and stick it in a white box somewhere, then it is not tied to hardware.

But it is handy to be able to move configs across the line. Some systems can not move a config from an edge router to a core router! (Usually because not only are they different hardware architectures, they are essentially totally different software with a similar looking skin)