2.5GbE Linux Firewall Micro Appliance Celeron N5105 4xIntel I225 Nic Firewall Router PC Barebone No Ram No SSD AES-NI

First thing I did was boot to OPNsense and install. Device works great. Using it with two ports trunked with a 2.5gb switch, VLAN tagging, etc., Everything I want to enable with OPNsense just works, including ZENarmor (aka Sensei), Squid proxy, IDS, VPN, etc. It does run hot with the passive cooling (150*F) and I need to add a fan for the case before the summer just to circulate the air, but it's been perfectly stable.

I have a total of five of these. Two of them randomly died while the third is still running fine. The dead ones both contained the most generic and worst SATA SSD I’ve ever seen. When it fails, the system doesn’t even see the drive anymore. Since the SATA SSDs are 2.5 inch, they’ll be mounted to the bottom plate. If you see four screws toward the center of the bottom plate, swap the SSD out for a better unit. I swapped mine out with WD Blue Nvme SSDs (this unit supports two total nvme SSDs). The CPU is fantastic, there’s two memory slots (mine came populated with 1 8G dimm) and the storage. The other option is a no-name nvme SSD which seems to work okay (~100MB/sec, so not a fast device but I suppose reliable?)

I am using this thing right now and I love it. It does run hot (stays around 56-60c), I bought it openbox/used so not sure if that is why but other than that it works perfectly fine as far as functionality. The higher temps I don't like is more of a personal preference and actually it is within the temp operating spec. I just had hoped with the large size of the outside heatsink/enclosure that it would promote better passive cooling. This is my second firewall appliance ive bought for my personal use so maybe the temps are just normal... as far as everything else, works awesome; very happy overall!

I purchased this system to use as a firewall for my home. I gave it 4 stars as it kept overheating and shutting down, I was able to disassemble the system and determine it had insufficient thermal paste applied. after cleaning and applying the proper amount of paste the system now runs error-free.

10 months update! Recently Upgraded to PFSense 2.7 CE Release on two of the N5105 4*Intel I225-V(B3) UDE units (bare metal). 2.7 supports the network I226 version too. out of the box, unit1 had the first factory bios, I sent MOGINSOK a message here on Amazon and they gave the link and instructions for bios refresh. This enables full performance of the unit but also comes with a note about higher temperatures. I initially had an issue with one unit running mid 50s C idle and over 70 when under load, but found it was a loose cooling block, secured it and re-pasted. now idle temps are in the 30s C, peaking 50 or below for short times with load. Cases do have some ventilation in bottom panel (with dust filters). There is room for a 40mm by 10mm fan, but I found that bringing in (or out) more airflow did not affect the temperatures very much and really isn't needed. After 10 months unit1 was still performing fine and stable with pfsense 2.6. second box with pfsense 2.7CE was solid with the dev snapshots so updated main box from 2.6 without worry. FreeBSD 14 has support for new hwpstate and you can add tunables for dev.hwpstate_intel.0.epp (0 thru 3) to be up to 100 to enable efficiency, 85 seems to be the sweet spot for low idle CPU speed and turbo when needed. I226 network ports are now sold - PFSense 2.7CE supports I226. Seller is friendly and responsive to messages. Fast shipping with Amazon fulfillment, better experience than other markets.