[H-GEN] CRUX (A programmers linux distro)

[David Jericho]

Scott Burns wrote:

>     I'd be curious to see what actually took more power and by how 
> much, an
> adsl modem with it's transformer or my 486 with it's AT power supply.


I just went and checked the power usage of a Cisco 828 S.HDSL router. 
 From the power packs, maxmimum power of 3 amps at 5 volts. The Netcomm 
NB1300 is rated at a 800 milliamps at 9 volts, and a Snapgear SME550 (I 
believe it's now called the CyberGuard SG550) at 2 amps at 5 volts. I 
don't have the equipment to more accurately measure their draw.

> My money would be on the modem, but not by more than a factor of two.


Digging through Intel documentation, it appears that the DX2 draws a 
maximum of 1.2 amps at 5 volts. By the time you add power supply 
ineffiency, memory controllers, network cards, video cards, and idle IO 
controllers, enough said.

> floppyfw, that fit into less than 100mb of hard drive space.  There is
> way too much complexity there for my liking.


That's one of my primary objections to using Unix machines as routers. 
There is the capability of doing much more than just routing, so when it 
comes to forensic work, or configuration, there is much more to worry 
about and get correct. I work to make my life easier, not more difficult.

>     Given you have put forward your opinion that PCs do not make good
> firewall/routers, what would you recommend to someone on dialup?

In anycase, I did not actually say PCs, I said Unix environments. But 
that's splitting straws, and I've read enough political crap from 
elsewhere today so I won't go down this track. :)

I'll answer the question as I perceive you meant it. Any of the 
previously mentioned products would work successfully I believe. I 
haven't used a modem for a few years now, so I'd have to actually do 
some research to give you a better answer than that.

-- 
David Jericho
Senior Systems Administrator, Tucana Technologies