I have read many articles concerning using an old PC as a router/firewall but they only seem to include two PCs. One as the router/firewall and the other as the work station.

My questions are:

1. Has anyone done this using three NIC's?
(One to the modem and the other two to the two computers sharing the internet connection)

2. How is the speed? I would like the two PCs to share a 4MB cable internet connection.

3. What software would you recomend? Slackware?

1. Don't. go spend $10 on a cheap switch and connect both machines to that. you don't want to have multiple lans and all that. the way the router is set up you just want an "inside" and and "outside" interface. It's not that people have only done this with 2 machines, they are simply representing a generic internal lan structure with a single machine.

2. depends on many different things, but a 4mb connection??? you'll be on a 100mbps network at least, why should a puny 4mbps be a problem?

3. get something dedicated for the job if that's all you're doing with it... http://ipcop.sf.net http://smoothwall.org

1. Read acid_kewpie's reply

2. Here I share 5 PC's on a 4 Mbit connection, internally it's all 100 Mbit, no problem

3. You could use slackware, setting it up will be a nice learning experiance, if you don't want to spend much time setting it up acid_kewpie's reply is your answer

I want to do it without spending any money for a router.

It was hell to convince my wife for the money for the internet, let alone to start buying more hardware.

I have three pcs and a spare that I would like to use as a router, I just don't know how.

You don't need a router, just a cheap switch.

This should be your setup



http://www.nukey.nl/images/temp/mianve.jpg

Is it possible to use an old PC as a router without having to buy a router or a switch?


Example:


********************************(PC1)***************
********************************/*******************
*******************************/*********************
****************************** /********************
(Internet)-----------(PC as router)----************************
***************************** \************************
*******************************\************************
********************************\**********************
********************************(PC2)******************

Yes, but you'll need a switch as stated above to connect those two computers to the router/firewall computer.

Please enlighten me as to how




PLEASE!!!!

Can't I just put three NICs on the PC used as a router?

Yes, that's also possible but then you come to the point acid_kewpie mentioned. You have to have 3 NICs (network-cards) in the router-pc as in the picture on the link below:

But that takes a "little" more work to accomplish

http://www.nukey.nl/images/temp/mianve2.jpg

That is exactly what I'm looking for Nukey.

A PC/Router with three NICs.

You got it exactly!!!

Now where do I start?

I already have the hardware

If you really want i that way, which I wouldn't reccomend (a switch can save you hours of configuration). But hee, it's a nice project hehe

What i would do.

Install slackware, cofigure eth0 to recieve IP adress from provider.

Give eth1 192.168.1.0
Give eth2 192.168.2.0

Give pc1 192.168.1.1 255.255.255.0 192.168.1.0 (default gateway)
Give pc2 192.168.2.1 255.255.255.0 192.168.2.0 (default gateway)
(you could also set the dhcpd daemon on both interface but this is easier maybe

If that's done your pc's can "talk" to your server on the seperate interfaces. and your "pc as router" can connect to the internet.
Than you should enable ipforwarding (can't (yet) help you on that one, "chmod +x /etc/rc.d/rc.ip_forward" is where i would start, i have no experiance in that area (yet).

And last, but actualy most import is to configure IPTables on you eth0 interface to secure your "pc as router"

For the rest -> GOOGLE

You're the fuc*'n man nukey!!

Thanks a bunch!

That's the answer I was looking for.

I really appreciate it. For a moment I was breif moment looking into WinXP ICS, but you saved the day. A windows firewall is a scary thought indeed.

Slackware as a router/firewall...now that's the ticket!

I couldn't resist trying this router-shit so i took an old laptop, put 2 PCMCIA cards in it and made the network as shown below.

As for the routing stuff:

Enable ipforwarding like i said above (chmod +x /etc/rc.d/rc.ip_forward).
Make (at least these) two iptables rules:

iptables --table nat --append POSTROUTING --out-interface eth0 -j MASQUERADE
iptables --append FORWARD --in-interface eth1 -j ACCEPT

choose the right eth0 and eth1 for your interfaces.

You might wanne read up on iptables and make sure all the ports are closed on the interface connected to the internet.

Good luck.

http://www.nukey.nl/images/temp/rout...ingrouting.jpg


And Windows with 3 network cards ? That'll be like rebooting 3 time as much as usual

slackware as a router / firewall really isn't the ticket when ready built tickets already exist just fine. In fact opcop or smoothwall do have configuration in them for additional interfaces, using "blue" interfaces in addition to the standard internal "green" and external "red" interfaces... but a router is not a switch, don't mix the two things up.

but hey, no one ever listens to me anyway... spend 2 weeks getting slackware set up exactly as you want, or grab an ipcop cd, and be ready running in 10 minutes tops...