[178197] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: OT - Small DNS "appliances" for remote offices.
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Mel Beckman)
Thu Feb 19 14:47:57 2015
X-Original-To: nanog@nanog.org
From: Mel Beckman <mel@beckman.org>
To: Denys Fedoryshchenko <denys@visp.net.lb>
Date: Thu, 19 Feb 2015 19:47:48 +0000
In-Reply-To: <38b98679e5ec3e8362b9c83e5a6e581a@visp.net.lb>
Cc: "<nanog@nanog.org>" <nanog@nanog.org>
Errors-To: nanog-bounces@nanog.org
If your time is worth anything, you can't beat the Mac Mini, especially for=
a branch office mission-critical application like DNS.
I just picked up a Mini from BestBuy for $480. I plugged it in, applied the=
latest updates, purchased the MacOSX Server component from the Apples Stor=
e ($19), and then via the Server control panel enabled DNS with forwarding.
Total time from unboxing to working DNS: 20 minutes.
The Server component smartly ships with all services disabled, in contrast =
to a lot of Linux distros, so it's pretty secure out of the box. You can ha=
rden it a bit more with the built-in PF firewall. The machine is also IPv6 =
ready out of the box, so my new DNS server automatically services both IPv4=
and IPv6 clients.
You get Apple's warranty and full support. Any Apple store can do testing a=
nd repair.
And with a dual-core 1.4GHz I5 and 4GB memory, it's going to handle loads o=
f DNS requests.
Of course, if your time is worth little, spend a lot of time tweaking slow,=
unsupported, incomplete solutions.
-mel
=20
On Feb 19, 2015, at 11:32 AM, Denys Fedoryshchenko <denys@visp.net.lb>
wrote:
> On 2015-02-19 18:26, Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu wrote:
>> On Thu, 19 Feb 2015 14:52:42 +0000, David Reader said:
>>> I'm using several to connect sensors, actuators, and such to a private
>>> network, which it's great for - but I'd think at least twice before dep=
loying
>>> one as a public-serving host in user-experience-critical role in a remo=
te
>>> location.
>> I have a Pi that's found a purpose in life as a remote smokeping sensor =
and
>> related network monitoring, a task it does quite nicely.
>> Note that they just released the Pi 2, which goes from the original sing=
le-core
>> ARM V6 to a quad-core ARM V7, and increases memory from 256M to1G. All a=
t the
>> same price point. That may change the calculus. I admit not having gott=
en one
>> in hand to play with yet.
> Weird thing - it still has Ethernet over ugly USB 2.0
> That kills any interest to run it for any serious networking applications=
.
>=20
> ---
> Best regards,
> Denys
