![]() ![]() One major problem when using a laptop for this type of project is that it has one Ethernet port available and no way to expand it by relying on the expansion slots as you would with a desktop computer. I know that some users say that a laptop can take advantage of its battery and remain active even after the power brick has been removed (which is obvious), but I have three old laptops around and all three (from different brands) require a continuous connection to a power outlet (the batteries are toasted), so, unless you have a fairly new laptop to use for this project, I wouldn’t get my hopes up on relying on the battery as a built-in UPS for the DYI router. A laptop will need a bit more and the model that I use can go up to 90W, so take that into account before deciding if it’s worth building your own router since it’s going to have to work 24/7. The usual consumer-type router has a power consumption of about 10W (such as the Asus RT-AC86U), while a commercial-level router, such as the DrayTek Vigor2926 will require a lot more, going up to about 29W. The Atheros AR5B95 WiFi card is a bit old and does not support the 802.11ac WiFi standard (only the a/b/g/n), nor the 5GHz band, so, unless I am going to use a wireless access point, the wireless clients will have to connect only to the 2.4GHz network (the advantage is that the large majority of wireless devices can still only connect to the 2.4GHz band). ![]() The processor is far more than what we’re ever going to need (but, the more power, the better), same as the 4GB of RAM or the ridiculous amount of storage (it’s better to allocate only a part of it for the router software). PFSENSE RASPBERRY PI PCLike I said before, it would be ideal to use a desktop PC (mini-ATX should be perfect), but for this guide, I only have an HP Pavilion dv6 laptop available, so that’s what I’m going to use. ![]() PFSENSE RASPBERRY PI SOFTWAREThe router is a very basic computer that is especially designed in a manner to move the data between multiple computer networks, so any laptop or desktop PC that was released the last 10 or even 15 years ago should have no trouble running any software that would turn it into a networking router most would actually be seriously overkill. And this takes us to the first step on turning your laptop into a router and that’s preparing and understanding the hardware. That’s not always the case and you may only have an old laptop available that you can use to turn it into a router and no, it will not be compatible with any expansion cards, but there are some USB to Ethernet adapters available that you can use for the LAN port (depending on your USB ports, you may even get close to 1Gbps). The general consensus is that you should use a desktop PC with some expansion slots available since a computer doesn’t (usually) have more than one Ethernet port and, if you intend to add some wired client devices to the network, you will need at least an additional LAN port. Don’t let that discourage you though, since building your own router will help you learn a lot more about how networking works and you will also get the option to configure pretty every aspect of your router. Of course, let’s not forget RouterOS from Miktrotik or Sophos, but what all these software have in common is that they’re commercial-grade, so, if you expected the same type of configuration as on a consumer-based router, well, it’s going to require a bit more technical knowledge, especially if you intend to run some more advanced features. ![]() The open-source pfSense which is based off FreeBSD is one of the most popular ways to transform a computer into a router and there is also VyOS which has a helpful community behind it due to Ubiquiti’s EdgeOS (both it and VyOS are forked from Vyatta). If you were wondering whether it’s possible to turn an old PC into a router, know that it’s very much possible and there are also more than one ways to achieve it. ![]()
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