Fujitsu Futro S920 Thin Client as opnsense firewall

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userrrr

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Nov 2, 2023
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I found an S920 with a GX-415GA in my basement and wanted to use it to migrate my old Opnsense box. An I340 quad-port gigabit card is installed with a physical port for WAN and another port with 4 VLANs for my internal network. After I loaded the configuration onto the S920, I only got 500Mbit/s in the download. I have a 1Gbits/500Mbits down/up internet connection.

Does anyone have experience with this setup and get better values?
I've already tried everything from tunables to deactivating IPS, but I can't get past the values mentioned.
 

gjvanderheiden

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Jan 20, 2024
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@userrr I've got something very simular:
A Fujitsu S920 with opnsense
CPU: GX-424CC
NIC: Fujitsu quad NIC, I340.

Tested it and it ran around 950Mbit on local little test setup. I have the tunables on and run with simple firewall rules.

Sure you ran iperf3 with the -R option? I didn't and got confused for a bit.
 

boerni666

New Member
Sep 8, 2023
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Make sure to have an up-to-date bios and PCIe2.0 with FreeDOS and editcmos.exe enabled.


Also i think OpenWRT runs faster on these machines, since its more lightweight. i get full NAT Performance (2,35gbit/s) with cheap shitty Realtek 8125B Cards on my GX-415GA S920 Router.
 

userrrr

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Nov 2, 2023
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Make sure to have an up-to-date bios and PCIe2.0 with FreeDOS and editcmos.exe enabled.


Also i think OpenWRT runs faster on these machines, since its more lightweight. i get full NAT Performance (2,35gbit/s) with cheap shitty Realtek 8125B Cards on my GX-415GA S920 Router.
OK so there isn't really a way of improving my speeds with opnsense? I already installed the latest BIOS, but what do you mean with "editcmos.exe enabled"?
 

boerni666

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Sep 8, 2023
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Hello fanoush, very interesting! o)

[...]

Code:
> EditCMOS.exe SetID:0x01B7=0x0151
Thank you! o)
This command enables PCIe2.0 on the FutroS920. Boot into FreeDOS and use the attached editcmos.exe tool.

You can verify by looking at the output of sudo lspci -vvv and look at the LnkCap Speeds
 

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boerni666

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Sep 8, 2023
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i can saturate 2.5GB links, i think people with 10GB Hardware in their futros claimed sth about 3.2GB from port to port.
 
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userrrr

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Nov 2, 2023
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This command enables PCIe2.0 on the FutroS920. Boot into FreeDOS and use the attached editcmos.exe tool.

You can verify by looking at the output of sudo lspci -vvv and look at the LnkCap Speeds
So I tested it out, but I can't get it to work. It says it applie it, but still shows as pcie v1.
I also found an HP NC364T Quad NIC, does anybody have experience with this kind. Does it work better?
 

ilib5

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Mar 3, 2024
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Hi,

I bought a Fujitsu Futro S920 and would like to install a dual port gigabit Ethernet Intel card (actually from HP) and also a NVME disk (PCIe 3).
The board has a PCIe and a mini PCIe interfaces available.
Is the PCIe more suitable for the NVME disk and the mPCIe for the Ethernet card?

I've already read about riser cards for connecting the Ethernet card to the PCIe interface, but if the best option would be to connect it to the mPCIe interface are there riser cards for it?
 

boerni666

New Member
Sep 8, 2023
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Theres no NVME. The Board has a PCIe x4, Mini PCIe and one mSATA slot. No M.2!

Just buy an mSATA SSD, you won't notice the difference for Openwrt/pf/opensense purposes.

With an PCIe x4 to NVME adapter, you could install an NVME, but i think thats overkill and a waste of bandwidth for this machine.

There are adapters from minipcie to normal PCIe, but you can also just buy gigabit and dual gigabit (or 2.5G) Minipcie cards on aliexpress.The WLGQ PCIex8 riser from Amazon is also a perfect fit. Make sure to buy low profile cards (for the case-slot). Minipcie can be half or fullsize, mine didnt came with an holder, i just used some zip-ties.
 

ilib5

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Mar 3, 2024
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Theres no NVME. The Board has a PCIe x4, Mini PCIe and one mSATA slot. No M.2!

Just buy an mSATA SSD, you won't notice the difference for Openwrt/pf/opensense purposes.

With an PCIe x4 to NVME adapter, you could install an NVME, but i think thats overkill and a waste of bandwidth for this machine.

There are adapters from minipcie to normal PCIe, but you can also just buy gigabit and dual gigabit (or 2.5G) Minipcie cards on aliexpress.The WLGQ PCIex8 riser from Amazon is also a perfect fit. Make sure to buy low profile cards (for the case-slot). Minipcie can be half or fullsize, mine didnt came with an holder, i just used some zip-ties.
I'm planning to use this for a router, firewall and small server for some services, so I'll install a full operating system.
I have an extra NVME and a 2.5 SSD extra disks, that's why I asked about it.
The mSATA that comes with the box has only 8GB. It's enough for some time...

I also have the dual gigabit ethernet card, so will not buy another one.
A PCIe riser x1 is enough for the double gigabit, right? 1 Gb/s ~ 120MB/s times 2 = 240MB/s which is roughly at the limit of x1, right? or wrong?

Maybe I need to change the BIOS settings to have a x4 PCIe, still have to read it thoroughly.

Thank you.
 

boerni666

New Member
Sep 8, 2023
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well, try out if its enough and see if the driver overhead isnt too big. you can always update the bios and change the bios setting with the editcmos tool to get PCIe Gen 2.

You could also use the 2.5" SSD, just use a 90° angled sata connector to reach the sata port under the heatsink, also you need a floppy power to sata connector, then you can get the power of the board.
 

ilib5

New Member
Mar 3, 2024
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Humm,

When I try to do editcmos.exe save=file.txt in the FreeDOS command line there seems to be an error.

Code:
Could not find a suitable BIOS interface.
Returning 2 (0x02)
I've already upgraded the BIOS.

What could be wrong?