[CentOS] Re: Firewall frustration

[Steven Vishoot]

--- Johnny Hughes <johnny at centos.org> wrote:

> Chris Mauritz wrote:
> > Ugo Bellavance wrote:
> >> Mark Weaver wrote:
> >>> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> >>> Hash: SHA1
> >>>
> >>> On Tue, 1 Jan 2008 08:57:22 -0500
> >>> Robert Moskowitz <rgm at htt-consult.com> wrote:
> >>>> Have you ever thought about how rare floppy
> drives are now?  At best
> >>>> you go with a bootable usb, if your notebook
> supports bootable USB.
> >>>> My Libretto does have a bootable floppy, but
> that is something extra
> >>>> to carry.  It will not boot from anything else
> (besides its HD).  My
> >>>> nc4010 (this notebook) will boot from usb.  My
> corp notebook (nc2400)
> >>>> is locked down; and I don't see any value at
> getting corp IT bent out
> >>>> of shape.
> >>>
> >>> why would you even think about using a Notebook
> computer as a firewall?
> >>> I was assuming you were going to delegate this
> task to an older machine
> >>> with sufficient resources to handle the task and
> not give the task to a
> >>> notebook computer.
> >>
> >> I guess he wants it to be portable.
> >>
> >> He seems to be knowing his requirements a lot
> better than we do.  It
> >> looks like he wants an easy firewall that would
> boot for HD only, cost
> >> nothing, and runs with usb ethernet devices.
> >>
> >> I really think he should carry an embedded
> firewall (like a soekris or
> >> a wrap) with pfsense on it.
> > 
> > Old laptops make pretty good firewalls, I think. 
> They take little
> > space, have a built-in battery backup and built-in
> keyboard/monitor to
> > use when you are visiting the datacenter.   I have
> repurposed a couple
> > of older laptops for these reasons since the
> machine doesn't need to be
> > very fast to accomplish the mission.  A lot of 3-4
> year old laptops cave
> > in under the weight of Windows, but are really
> overkill for a simple
> > unix firewall.  Better than sending them to the
> dustbin.
> > 
> 
> hmmm ... I would think that they do not handle heat
> very well though.
> 
> Maybe they do, and certainly it is better than
> throwing them away I guess.
> 
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The bad thing is if you always keep the laptop plugged
in the battery will be useless and will not hold a
charge. That is what happen with one of my laptops.