I just recently got 1 gigabit up/down at home when they put in fiber. Now I’m looking for a router/firewall to use. I run a homelab with a few VMs.

I was looking at getting a Cisco router to tinker with, as I’ve just finished a course on IOS. What routers would you recommend (2nd hand) for less than 150€? Is Cisco even feasible at this price point or should I just get a mini pc and run pfsense/opnsense?

I’ve looked at the ISR900 and it seems to meet my requirements, but I am not sure if it also offers a web interface, which would be quite useful for me.

Bit of an unstructured post but I hope you’ll be able to help me regardless.

EDIT: I ended up getting a mikrotik hAP ac3 router. It seems to meet my requirements and after trying the routerOS demo they have up I decided that it would work for me.

  • @some_guy
    1•9 months ago

    I got a mini pc and ran pfSense back in the day. I’ve been using pfSense ever since, though I’m now on their hardware (which costs more than your stated budget).

    I agree with folks recommending Ubiquiti, but I’m also barely literate in the aspects of the market that matter. I just recognize the brand as trusted and we used their devices at a job I had.

    For some reason, I have a negative view of Mikrotik - as though I’ve read something damning in a security-related article about them - but I can’t back that up. If I did, it was only once.

    Stay away from TP-LINK. I had one of their devices and it was garbage.