[Tea_J]

Hi guys

im setting up an internet cafe.. I would like to know if there is a broadband router that is programmable? specially in the bandwidth management area.. i would like for it to limit max bandwidth per connection..

I heard netgear has one but cant find it on their site

please help

[PLOBBY]

There are plenty, the program your looking for is QoS i believe. How many computers will be on the connection? If there enough and there getting used a lot, cisco might be a good choice?

[four4875]

you're looking for traffic shaping, a must if you're gonna be splitting bandwidth to multiple people.

i would reccomend a router OS called Mikrotik its intended for ISPs and such, and comes with components to do authentication, traffic shaping, can work as a wireless AP, do ptp wireless bridges, and im sure youll find alot more features in their site haha.

then you can set it up so people have to log in to access net (good for like wifi hotspots) or authenticate wireless by its MAC address, limit bandwidth, all kinds of fun stuff that ISPs do hehe. just put that on a PC with a couple NICs and you should be fiine, a 333 mhz cpu on a single board PC router setup can handle the traffic shaping of a t1 worth of bandwidth easily, so you hsouldnt need too much at all.

also i think it can be done in smoothwall, which is free but im not sure on what plugins and stuff you'd need, and how easy it would be.

[Tea_J]

thank you for your tips guys..

the router will be handling around 50 units only and doing surfing, filetransfers, network gaming, and online gaming

@four4875

just put that on a PC with a couple NICs and you should be fiine, a 333 mhz cpu on a single board PC router setup can handle the traffic shaping of a t1 worth of bandwidth easily, so you hsouldnt need too much at all.

umm.. does this mean that the router is also PC dependent? because i was hoping for a STAND ALONE setup that doesnt require a dedicated PC (except for configuring it ofcourse)...

Because if a PC is involved, i might as well do so using many different software such as WinGate, etc.. i need something that's completely stand alone.. are we on the same frequency? lol



what about 3rd party router firmwares? is there one available for LinkSys routers?

[trey_w]

I recommend M0n0wall for what your trying to do.

[four4875]

so you cant have a system running in place of a standalone router? i dont really see the difference between a little pc sittin somewhere runnin and a like linksys home router, except size.

you can run it on a small single board pc that has cpu, ram, and flash memory on it, no video, 3 LAN and 2 miniPCI slots.
http://www.routerboard.com/
we (company i work for) have a couple RB532s in place for a wireless PTP to PTMP setup, its been working great.

[Tea_J]

so you cant have a system running in place of a standalone router? i dont really see the difference between a little pc sittin somewhere runnin and a like linksys home router, except size.

you can run it on a small single board pc that has cpu, ram, and flash memory on it, no video, 3 LAN and 2 miniPCI slots.
http://www.routerboard.com/
we (company i work for) have a couple RB532s in place for a wireless PTP to PTMP setup, its been working great.

well this is the easiest and most flexible way to do so.. however, we're trying to avoid that.. though it's small space consumption, we want totally maintenance free setup so we dont have to worry about it..a PC/ICS host can have problems.. memory, LAN bandwidth, the little extra space it takes up, would still require keyboard and mouse to administer (could use remote administrator), and can get affected with viruses and other nasties..

i've stopped using computer ICS host since 2002 when setting up internet cafes.. it's just not worth it.. compared to simply having a ROUTER, and a couple of SWITCHES.. it's perfect.. but this time i need a "little more" functionality

[TalRW]

Just FYI smoothwall/m0n0wall/IPcop are leaps and bounds ahead of windows ICS. Trust me, you won't get viruses as these are based off linux and freeBSD platforms. Also with the mods you can get for them you can get insane functionality out of them. Also if you set up a decently powered rig you won't experiance any of those problems such as memory and network bandwith, in fact most of the times a standalone PC can be more powerfull then say a home router. This can be seen for example when bit torrents can crash regular consumer routers but smoothwall and the others can handle the load just fine. I seriously think you should reconsider.

[Tea_J]

@TalRW

thanks for the advise.. i will certainly give it more attention now

But im still interested with a 3rd party firmware for routers.. anyone got the leads? hehehe thansk