[SOLVED] Best Distro for use as a Router/Firewall

diilbert · 05-07-2010, 08:23 PM

I am just wondering what the general consensus is among LQ users. What is the best distro to use when building a router/firewall box?

I have tested Smoothwall, Engarde Linux and Linux LiveCD Router. I previously built a Gentoo box and setup it as a router, but everyday management could be tricky.

My network will look something like this:

Code:

DSL Modem -> ROUTER BOX -> Web Server
                        |
                        -> Media Server
                        |
                        -> Linksys Wifi Router -> Media Center
                                               |
                                               -> Desktop PC

The purpose of the gateway router is to give me greater control over traffic and to allow logging off all requests. At some point I will most likely employ some sort of nanny filter.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Thanks!

jlinkels · 05-07-2010, 08:36 PM

A distro doesn't make Linux.

You are around here long enough to know better to ask for 'best distro'. Look at distrowatch and if you can't find a thing use your own Debian Stable

jlinkels

win32sux · 05-07-2010, 10:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by diilbert

I am just wondering what the general consensus is among LQ users.

There is none.

Quote:

What is the best distro to use when building a router/firewall box?

Your best bet is to provide some kind of list of what your requirements and/or desires are. Then this becomes a matter of helping you find the most compliant distro, which can be done somewhat objectively. All you've given us so far is this:

Quote:

The purpose of the gateway router is to give me greater control over traffic and to allow logging off all requests. At some point I will most likely employ some sort of nanny filter.

...and any distro would do just fine for that.

In other words, if this is all you need, then just use your favorite distro.

John VV · 05-08-2010, 01:25 AM

i would use RHEL 5.5 or CentOS ,with SELinux set to "enforcing "
but that is me I like red hat .

diilbert · 05-08-2010, 05:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jlinkels

A distro doesn't make Linux.

You are around here long enough to know better to ask for 'best distro'. Look at distrowatch and if you can't find a thing use your own Debian Stable

jlinkels

You are right. I was referring to the pre-packaged firewall/router distros. I will most likely just roll with my own brew of applications and fav distro.

win32sux · 05-08-2010, 12:04 PM

Moved to Distributions, as this isn't a security question.

dunix · 05-08-2010, 12:17 PM

Does it have to be Linux? I've found pfSense to be extremely stable. It is basically FreeBSD repackaged to be a router/fw. There is also quite a bit of documentation on building a router/fw out of OpenBSD.

Some other Linux options specifically built to fill that need would be Untangle, IPCop (they might be dead though..), and Astaro has a free version.

However, you can really use any distro. I would suggest not choosing one with a short life cycle (IE: Ubuntu(non-LTS), Fedora, etc).

salasi · 05-08-2010, 05:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by diilbert

...I have tested Smoothwall, Engarde Linux and Linux LiveCD Router. I previously built a Gentoo box and setup it as a router, but everyday management could be tricky.

... I was referring to the pre-packaged firewall/router distros.

Assuming that you are asking about the pre-packaged firewall/SME/SoHo type distros, a copy of Linux Format has a review of firewall distros and the result of their review is

Code:

 ebox platform       (9/10)
 ClearOS             (9/10)
 Smoothwall Express  (8/10)
 IPCop               (8/10)

(IPCop is better on traffic analysis and graphing than Smoothwall Express, but SE is particularly easy to set up and get going; unclear what their ranking of these two would be.)

(Also tested PfSense 7/10, Smoothwall Advanced 6/10, Monowall 5/10 ...PfSense being marked down for being just a firewall and nothing else, SA for its price, and Monowall for being determinedly minimal, although that is probably a good thing in a firewall.)

Which was a bit of a surprise to me, as I hadn't even heard of either of their top two choices. What is a bit unclear (to me, at least) is whether there is any real, functional, advantage other than ease of set up, from using a pre-packaged distro rather than starting from a commonly available distro and making the modifications yourself. In fact, that seems to be unclear to the authors of eBox too, as it is built on top of Ubuntu Server 8.04.