Current popular QOTOM or similar hardware for home UTM-9?

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/Qotom-Q355G4-Fanless-Mini-PC-Broadwell-Core-i5-5250U-HD-Graphics-HD-Video-VGA-Pocket-PC/32799580496.html?spm=2114.search0104.3.2.v45kqz&ws_ab_test=searchweb0_0,searchweb201602_5_10152_10065_10151_10344_10068_10130_10345_10324_10342_10547_10343_10340_10341_10548_10545_10541_10084_10083_10307_5640015_10178_10060_10155_10154_10056_10055_10539_10538_5370015_10537_10312_10536_10059_10313_10314_10534_10533_100031_10103_10073_10102_5630015_10142_10107,searchweb201603_1,ppcSwitch_5&btsid=760af3f2-8542-4429-890f-cbdb2fa4774b&algo_expid=cd00b238-ba0c-4fa8-8c46-eec9a32c0be1-0&algo_pvid=cd00b238-ba0c-4fa8-8c46-eec9a32c0be1

Slightly over your budget but probably best bang for the buck.  Been running this for the last 2 months with no issues.  Only gotcha is the port arrangement.  Physical ports don't correspond to the way software identifies the ports.  They are 1, 3, 4, 2 instead of 1 2 3 4.  I run utm under esxi which allows me to remap the ports and make better use of the box by running other servers (freepbx).

There's a lengthy thread on the pfsense forum discussing this box - https://forum.pfsense.org/index.php?topic=132528 .

Overall, I think money well spent considering processing power and power consumed.

Thanks Jay Jay, I appreciate your input.

I've gone from running ASL 0.8 (I think), on a 486, to higher performance hardware,

ASG, UTM, ESXi vm and now I'm looking for low power and quiet.

The best price I can find on a QOTOM Q355G4 Mini PC w/ 8GB RAM + 16GB SSD - Core i5, AES-NI, 4 Intel LAN, 15Watts,

Industrial Mini PC Firewall Gateway Router (Q355G4-8R-16S) is CDN$500. + 13% VAT.

Slightly off topic, did you ever consider RPIPBX on a PI 3?

Mike

Look on amazon, ebay and aliexpress.  One of those should yield a favorable price.

The included ssd was junk (intel 525, 30gb).  Getting a unit without it would be ideal.  The included ram is $55USD on amazon so probably best to get the unit with the ram unless you have a ddr3 stick of 8gb laying around.

No interest in running a pbx on PI 3.  Running it on qotom box is a neater solution, one less piece of hardware, memory cards, etc.

Thanks, I'm looking in those 3 places.

Are you running your ESXi host on the QOTOM box?

Mike

Mike_Cunningham said:

Thanks, I'm looking in those 3 places.

Are you running your ESXi host on the QOTOM box?

Mike

Yes, along with 3 vm's at the moment, utm, freepbx, and cyberpower systems powerpanel business appliance (very small vm for managing ups).

Still have about 2 GB of ram left, might install some other lightweight vm's/servers in the future.

I think bang for the buck the qotom is the best deal out there.  The thread over on the pfsense.org forum convinced me to get this box.

You could save a little bit of money and go with a 120Gb SSD instead of 256Gb. 256Gb is way more than you will ever use. On my UTM I have a 120Gb SSD and it only uses 6% of a 40Gb data partition.

Amazon has the Qotom with recommended RAM and SSD. https://www.amazon.com/Qotom-Q355G4-Firewall-Ethernet-Barebone-Computer/dp/B06XJV9R8X

You sure that's the right link?  It brings up just the bare bones with no ram/ssd for $228USD + s/h.  I think this is the one you're referring to.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XPJKV5L/ref=s9_acsd_hps_bw_c_x_2_w

8GB ram module is $72 from newegg, and $59 from amazon. So $287 is less than the $301 (+ s/h) that I paid, but too late now.   I wanted to get the box with the ram due a number of posts about ram incompatibility.  The ram module model below is according to the pfsense thread.

https://www.amazon.com/Kingston-Technology-1600MHz-PC3-12800-KVR16LS11/dp/B00CQ35HBQ

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820239697

After 2 months of use, space is plenty.  I'll never run out at this rate.  I have a spare 250gb ssd, but was concerned about excessive log writes.  Also, while a mechanical drive probably slows things down somewhat, for general utm function other than av scanning, it's still plenty fast.

Thanks.

I got tired of running a 600 watt PS and spinning 6 SATA drives,

just to run UTM in a vm, so i moved to a smaller, slower box.

Now I'd like to make another move to a mini PC or equiv for the UTM

and 'something' for freepbx.

Here's some dashboard pics from exsi.  First one from the main page.  Downloading at full bw (~320mbps), 2 freepbx calls going. 

Jay Jay said:

 

After 2 months of use, space is plenty.  I'll never run out at this rate.  I have a spare 250gb ssd, but was concerned about excessive log writes.  Also, while a mechanical drive probably slows things down somewhat, for general utm function other than av scanning, it's still plenty fast.

 

 

So, your log disk is an external spinning drive?

I was looking at the AliExpress site and noticed they have Q355G4 units with 4th gen i7 processors,

versus 5th gen i5 procs. Not that I can afford it but, would the i7 be a better solution for an ESXi host

with a couple of vm's (like you have)? 

Also, the AliExpress and Amazon.com sites have a hugely better selection of QOTOM units compared to Amazon.ca

Mike

Jay Jay said:

 

After 2 months of use, space is plenty.  I'll never run out at this rate.  I have a spare 250gb ssd, but was concerned about excessive log writes.  Also, while a mechanical drive probably slows things down somewhat, for general utm function other than av scanning, it's still plenty fast.

 

 

So, your log disk is an external spinning drive?

I was looking at the AliExpress site and noticed they have Q355G4 units with 4th gen i7 processors,

versus 5th gen i5 procs. Not that I can afford it but, would the i7 be a better solution for an ESXi host

with a couple of vm's (like you have)? 

Also, the AliExpress and Amazon.com sites have a hugely better selection of QOTOM units compared to Amazon.ca

Mike

No, you can mount a standard 2.5" laptop drive internally.  There's a sata port and sata power plug.  I got rid of the 30gb mini pcie ssd.

As for the cpu's, I don't know.  I'd say the difference is marginal at best.  Maybe a few points higher for the 4500u.

https://ark.intel.com/compare/75460,84984

They're roughly 18 months apart in terms of release dates.  Both dual core with hyperthreading.  The 4500u has a slightly higher clock speed and 1 more MB cache.

I one key feature as it relates to virtualization is VT-d support on the 5250u.  As I understand it, this allow mapping certain hardware directly to a vm rather than through software emulation.

https://software.intel.com/en-us/articles/intel-virtualization-technology-for-directed-io-vt-d-enhancing-intel-platforms-for-efficient-virtualization-of-io-devices

Search "I/O performance through direct Assignment"

I didn't implement my configuration this way with respect to network adapters.  I may try it later to see if there's any significant performance improvements or lower cpu usage.