miaoer

As the demand for internet access gradually increases, the performance of ordinary wireless routers can no longer meet the healthy online needs of today's internet.

To meet this demand, the protagonist of this chapter, the "soft router," was born. I will deeply share how I use soft routers and whether they are worth buying.

Soft Router#

A soft router is a type of industrial control device, commonly known as an industrial computer. You may not have heard of it, but it is likely used in various aspects of life, commonly found in industrial control applications across different fields. Simply put, it is a mini computer that provides low-power yet decent performance service scenarios.

The biggest difference between hard routers and soft routers is the hardware and software aspect; soft routers rely on software to perform routing functions, while hard routers use dedicated hardware for routing. We use soft routers to accomplish various services such as: (NAT traversal, DDNS, DNS resolution, Docker, NAS, VPN), etc.; because a soft router is essentially a computer that can achieve "multiple soft routers" under VT-D virtualization, doesn't that sound amazing?

But if I tell you that, without professional knowledge, to fully utilize the performance of a soft router, you must learn the basic operations of Linux for specific "customization" in these scenarios, such as compiling your own soft router firmware; if you are just starting out, you can download pre-made firmware from the internet or follow YOUTUBE or Bilibili video tutorials to install the iKuai + OpenWrt system as an entry-level soft router.

Tinkering with soft routers can be quite time-consuming and labor-intensive; if you don't have time, you might end up selling it or letting it gather dust at home, in which case I wouldn't recommend buying a soft router. Instead, you could try flashing a hard router to accomplish basic services.

How I Use Soft Routers#

My soft router is placed in the living room alongside the optical modem. The "J4105 finished soft router" I purchased has dual gigabit network ports and was sold for 699 last year. It also requires a laptop's DDR4 memory and hard drive to function properly, and you need to equip a switch. I happened to have a hard router, the "Xiaomi AC2100," which can be modified to AP mode (wired relay) to become a wireless switch that coexists with the soft router, forming a simple home network structure.

In my home network, it is directly connected to the optical modem via ETH0, while another virtual network card comes out from ETH1 to the wireless switch.

I chose to use VMware EXSI for my soft router and installed several virtual machines: iKuai, ROS, OpenWrt, CentOS.

Among them, iKuai is used for manual switching in case ROS or OpenWrt encounters issues for temporary use. For daily use, I still rely on the combination of ROS + OpenWrt as a dual soft router setup.

OpenWrt#

I previously used a high-end firmware made by Esir for OpenWrt, but due to the excessive number of plugins making it unstable, I switched to my own compiled firmware. I used several plugins that I needed to achieve NAT traversal, internet access, Docker, JD sign-in... Once configured, it generally doesn't require adjustments, and I just change nodes occasionally.

RouterOS#

I used a green version of ROS, which is directly connected to the optical modem in my home network. It mainly handles PPPOE dialing, DHCP server, DNS caching, IPV6, UPNP... It is very stable for daily use and has never crashed!

iKuai#

iKuai is generally used when the home network is down; I will turn it on for temporary internet access until I debug the other virtual machines, and I have only used it twice in a year, both due to errors in OpenWrt. The downside is that it requires more than 4GB of memory for installation, but in actual use, 2GB + others are sufficient, and it has a Chinese interface, making it a relatively user-friendly system.

CentOS#

CentOS is used to store downloaded movies and run a Minecraft server, utilizing NAT traversal through Frpc in OpenWrt for services. If there are more people, I manually turn on the fan for cooling. I also enabled SMB sharing and used FolderSync on my phone for incremental backups of my photo albums. However, I wouldn't store important data in the virtual machine, just in case that machine fails. (If you are willing)

So, is it recommended to buy?#

If you are willing to tinker, you can choose to play around with various features, provided you have strong search skills and a scientific internet environment. I have roughly outlined a recommendation guide for different groups of people below.

Recommended Buyer Groups#

• Very suitable for those who are not short on money
• Love to tinker with network devices
• Unsatisfied with their home network needs
• Need to run various services & applications
• University students tuning campus networks
• You have a large house with many people or devices needing internet access, allowing for flexible choices
• Shared broadband in rental housing

Not Recommended Buyer Groups#

• Non-university students using campus networks
• No time for tinkering
• Only engaging in scientific internet activities
• Do not want to invest in optimizing their home network
• Price-sensitive individuals
• Those who do not know how to use Linux or soft router systems

Hardware Suggestions#

Before you make a purchase, you can refer to the recommended data. Memory and hard drives can be chosen from finished products, while the barebone system needs to be equipped by yourself, allowing for flexible choices.

Recommended: For configuration testing, you can refer to YouTube's Lao Bai Jackstone

CPU#

The CPU determines your internet speed. For beginners, you can choose Intel J series processors such as: (J4015, J4125, J205). If you are on a tight budget and just want to play around, you can consider older Intel N series processors, but if you plan to upgrade soon, it's better to go for something more comfortable right away.

Network Ports#

If you are not playing with "multi-line multicast," dual network ports are sufficient for daily use. If you have multiple lines at home, you can consider 4 network ports or more, depending on how many multicast lines you have. All devices mainly connect through switches and soft routers; Intel network cards with drivers and virtualization are better than crab ones, while others are basically the same.

Memory#

Purchase or use spare laptop memory. If you are not using virtual machines, 4GB is sufficient. If you plan to use virtual machines, consider 8~16GB, with no difference in frequency. Lower memory is not recommended unless you are not using virtual machines and will leave it idle.

Hard Drive#

Purchase or use spare 2.5-inch solid-state drives or mechanical hard drives from laptops. Solid-state drives are used for storing virtual machines, while mechanical drives are for NAS use. If you are not using virtual machines, you can generally buy second-hand msata solid-state drives according to the interfaces on the soft router. [Tip: Do not buy second-hand mechanical hard drives; non-players should not take risks; most msata solid-state drives come from industrial computers.]

Conclusion#

It mainly depends on how you utilize the soft router. Like I just saw YOUTUBERS introducing this little gadget, I admit I got carried away. After buying it and setting up a dual soft router, its presence in my home gradually faded, and I began to feel it wasn't worth it until I started to delve into Linux-like systems and squeezed every bit of performance from the machine, even running two Windows virtual machines on the campus network... that's the joy of tinkering.

This article simply describes my non-professional background. If experts have better usage methods, please feel free to share. This article may be modified over time.

As for whether you think soft routers are a tax on intelligence, you can comment below to discuss with me.

If you ask me whether it is worth buying, I feel no regret while writing this article, and I will continue to use it. o (*≧▽≦) ツ┏━┓

This article is synchronized and updated to xLog by Mix Space. The original link is https://www.miaoer.net/posts/network/softrouter-de