Sanity check on new build

[Chris Moore]

PS. The system I am using to run VyOS is booting from an old 80 GB hard drive I had that has over 5 years of power on time and only 2GB of system memory. All I am using it for is a network switch and it just sits and runs. The way I configured it, I can SSH in to edit the config, which I have not needed to do after I initially got it setup.

If you put two drives in it, the installer will create a MD mirror for you during install. It was really easy. I got it running in an evening while I was watching TV.

 

[Chris Moore]

but my challenge is that I need 10Gbase-T

I can't recall you saying why it is that you really must have that and nothing else will work?

 

[deafen]

I can't recall you saying why it is that you really must have that and nothing else will work?

The workstation that really needs the bandwidth is on the other end of a Cat6 cable that goes between the first and second floor. When I had it installed, I asked about running fiber instead, and the quote went up by 4x (!).

However, I've solved the problem a different way by running VyOS in a VM to pass traffic between the 10G NIC and the rest of the system. It's currently configured as an L3 router, with the workstation on a different subnet. I originally tried to set it up as an L2 bridge, but ran into a pile of problems - probably due to some misunderstandings about how VMware handles vNICs and vSwitches. Now that it's running properly at layer 3, I'm going to try to reconfigure it as a bridge again.

Even if I have to leave it at layer 3, I'm totally happy - I'm getting the full 10Gb with CIFS in its current configuration. And I can return the switch to Amazon!

 

[Chris Moore]

The workstation that really needs the bandwidth is on the other end of a Cat6 cable that goes between the first and second floor. When I had it installed, I asked about running fiber instead, and the quote went up by 4x (!).

Yes, fiber can be really expensive when an installer is doing it. Still, it sounds like you got a solution going.
That's great.

 

[deafen]

Brief update. I redid the topology to do L2 bridging in the VM and removed the secondary vNIC from the FreeNAS box, and everything's working great. Thanks for the help!