100 Con-current Clients - Custom pfSense Build?

Forums › LAN (ethernet/Wifi/routers/Bluetooth) › 100 Con-current Clients - Custom pfSense Build?

AidanS

458 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 135

#156000 16-Nov-2014 00:47

Hi Everyone,

In January next year I've got the joyful job of setting up a wired network to power a 2 day long gaming LAN with 100+ attendees.

We're going to have a business class Fibre connection (100-200Mbps up/down) which should be perfect for our event. However, we have an extremely tight budget and after some research I've concluded that to run 100 concurrent gamers on such a budget a custom built server running pfSense may be the best I can get to an industrial level router.

Firstly, does anyone have any experience with this (or similar) router for PC software? Specifically in an enterprise environment?

Secondly, if I do go with a desktop/router solution, what sort of NIC will I need? Obviously 10/100/1000, and I'll need at least 2, 1 WAN, 1 LAN. Will I likely be able to use the 10/100/1000 built in card on an average desktop PC? Or will I need to get a higher grade level of NIC (possible models?).

Thanks for any help in advance, I've still got some time to get a quality solution rolling (Still got to organise WiFi for 100 concurrent users, but that's another ball game for now).

tl;dr: Will a pfSense Build be suitable for 100+ concurrent users? What quailty of NIC do I need to run the WAN and LAN ports?

Cheers,
Aidan.

SirHumphreyAppleby

2938 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1860

#1176603 16-Nov-2014 03:58

With particularly large numbers of active users, you will probably want to look at state table sizes and ensure you have sufficient memory.

In terms of networking hardware, I recommend Intel hardware as this is probably the best supported by FreeBSD. Look for cards supported by the em driver. Note that pfSense is based on an older version of FreeBSD so may not support all the hardware the latter does.

rhy7s

673 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 147

#1176675 16-Nov-2014 10:59

If you've got a machine with PCI-E slots and an Intel Pro dual gigabit NIC you should be able to cope.

AidanS

458 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 135

#1176676 16-Nov-2014 11:01

Awesome, thanks for the responses guys! Gives me a tad more hope :).

-A.

hio77

'That VDSL Cat'
13036 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 3896

ID Verified

Trusted

Lizard Networks

Subscriber

#1176679 16-Nov-2014 11:11

Depending on how far you wanna go, might wanna look at caching steam too.

http://blog.multiplay.co.uk/2014/04/lancache-dynamically-caching-game-installs-at-lans-using-nginx/

its effectiveness of recent has been slightly hit and miss (ngnix doesnt call back to doublecheck things, and so you can have stale cache issues sometimes.) but for 100+ people, chances are every one of them will get the TF2, Dota2 etc updates that are sure to hammer you!

#include <std_disclaimer>

Any comments made are personal opinion and do not reflect directly on the position my current or past employers may have.

AidanS

458 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 135

#1176692 16-Nov-2014 11:30

hio77: Depending on how far you wanna go, might wanna look at caching steam too.

http://blog.multiplay.co.uk/2014/04/lancache-dynamically-caching-game-installs-at-lans-using-nginx/

its effectiveness of recent has been slightly hit and miss (ngnix doesnt call back to doublecheck things, and so you can have stale cache issues sometimes.) but for 100+ people, chances are every one of them will get the TF2, Dota2 etc updates that are sure to hammer you!

Thanks for sharing, I didn't even think about the fact there being updates during the event. And if there were, oh dear a nightmare that'd be.

I'll definitely set this up for our network :)

Cheers,
Aidan.

hio77

'That VDSL Cat'
13036 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 3896

ID Verified

Trusted

Lizard Networks

Subscriber

#1176693 16-Nov-2014 11:32

AidanS:
hio77: Depending on how far you wanna go, might wanna look at caching steam too.

http://blog.multiplay.co.uk/2014/04/lancache-dynamically-caching-game-installs-at-lans-using-nginx/

its effectiveness of recent has been slightly hit and miss (ngnix doesnt call back to doublecheck things, and so you can have stale cache issues sometimes.) but for 100+ people, chances are every one of them will get the TF2, Dota2 etc updates that are sure to hammer you!

Thanks for sharing, I didn't even think about the fact there being updates during the event. And if there were, oh dear a nightmare that'd be.

I'll definitely set this up for our network :)

Cheers,
Aidan.

even at a smaller scale, has made a world of difference for lans..

Having the disk IO for it is the biggest limitation.

#include <std_disclaimer>

Any comments made are personal opinion and do not reflect directly on the position my current or past employers may have.