SDG #028 MikroTik RB2011UiAS Internet Gateway + A tired cat

This episode begins a home network rebuild, with the outgoing hardware examined first: a WatchGuard Firebox appliance that had been used for years as a router and VPN endpoint. Repurposed enterprise firewalls make sense on a budget, but they carry real penalties: noisy fans, high idle power draw for the throughput on offer, licensing that expires, and firmware that stops receiving attention long before the hardware fails. That context matters, because it explains the choice of replacement rather than simply defaulting to whatever the ISP supplied.

The MikroTik RB2011UiAS-RM is unboxed and examined in detail. It is a rack mount RouterBOARD combining five Gigabit and five Fast Ethernet ports, an SFP cage, PoE input, a serial console port and a small LCD, all running RouterOS. For anyone considering it, the appeal is the feature set per pound: full routing, firewalling, VLANs, queueing and multiple VPN protocols in software that is normally reserved for far more expensive equipment. The trade-off is the learning curve, since RouterOS expects the user to understand what is being configured, and MikroTik’s browser based demonstration is a sensible way to explore the interface before committing.

The teardown also sets up the next stage of the project, which is a modification to how the board is powered rather than relying on the supplied adaptor. Alternatives such as a software router build are mentioned for comparison, along with the access point that will handle wireless duties, since the RB2011UiAS-RM rack variant has no radio of its own. A thoroughly unconcerned cat provides the intermission.