I'm not afraid to try building a router on a spare computer or on a spare dlink with tomato or other firmware. Which is recommended for a home with multiple computers, a file server, and a retiree with some time on his hands? I don't game or stream audio/video.

Hi sundry_50, I'd take a look at pfSense (i.e., “making sense of packet filtering”). It's a customized version of FreeBSD tailored specifically for use as a perimeter firewall and router, and managed entirely from a web-based GUI. In addition to being a firewall and routing platform, pfSense includes a long list of other features, as well as a package system allowing its capabilities to be expanded even further. It's easy to setup and will run on dang near anything with a couple of good NIC adapters. FWIW, I wrote an article on my blog about my experience setting up and configuring a pfsense box.

Nice article @iceflatline.

I don't know about the rest of you folks, but the idea of running a box just for a home network firewall wouldn't be popular here. Noise, heat, power - all my "bits and pieces" certainly ain't your quietest fans in the world. Maybe if you already run that file-server 24x7 you don't care, but I'd opt for the dlink ...

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Thanks syg00. Sound advice and I agree.