I've been using Mandrake for a few years now and am a very satisfied Linux user.
I've used a Windows 2000 router with nat/dns/dhcp/ect...
I've also used Mandrake as the same thing.
I would like to use a distro that is optimized for router use with a web interface.
Webmin works but I would prefer one specific to the distro as with shorewall (http://shorewall.sourceforge.net).
I've looked at a few different distros and am running ipcop firewall version 1.3.0 with patches up to 9 (http://www.ipcop.org) right now.
I'm happy with this except it seems not to work with more then 2 ethernet cards.
It's built from shorewall and uses the same green/red network setup.
I would like to have one card on red (wan side) using dhcp and the rest of the cards on green (lan side) on different subnets.
The server has an Intel MMX processor @ 200 Mhz with 128 MB SDRAM.
i386 or i586 is needed.
I would like to have the following features on the router;
1) Routing
2) Port forwarding (NAT)
3) Firewall
4) DHCP (Static and dynamic)
5) Intrusion detection system (Updatable signatures)
6) Bandwidth monitoring
7) Support for more then 2 nics
8) Log rotating, security checks and other stuff like that would be a plus

Thank you for any help.
Drew

I run ClarkConnect on a couple boxes to share cable internet access at home and work. I think it's great. CC 2+ is based on RH9, and is completely package-compatible.

I also have a SmoothWall box sharing the dial-up access at the office at Church. Pretty good, but I like CC better. Only reason I have SW there is the dial-up. I haven't had the time yet to upgrade to SW 2, yet.

Two are P-133s, and the other a P-166, none with more than 64MB RAM and a couple-gigs of hard-drive. They were once desktop computers. I bought them from federal surplus for $15 each, so it's so it's not like they aren't the greatest.

FreeBSD will suit your needs exactly. I've alway liked BSD because of it's tight efficient and extreamly stable code. If you choose to go thisway, 4.10 is the one to get. I donnow howmany nicks freebsd can handle but it's definitely more than two.

regards,
Makko

I'll second the post on FreeBSD and add in OpenBSD as well.

I've always had a better experiance using a *BSD as a firewall/router than linux, with the exception of SmoothWall, which is a great product.

Webmin is available on both Free and OpenBSD.

I will add the oldest distro Slackware, very stable keeping things simple whether its servers configurations for bootup slackware is the best.

regards

argueing about distro is meaningless.
choose either 1 distro u like, and can operate in most *nix system.

Just to finish up here, I chose IPcop and am very happy with it.

I have used both Slackware and OpenBSD as routers. Both are simple, clean, and secure. The real difference lies in the software you use to get the job done. i.e - iptables for Linux vs. pf for OpenBSD