EdgeRouter Lite vs. Mikrotik RB2011iL-RM

[ddaenen1]

Again, choices to make. Today i picked up a Synology RS214 which i bought 2nd hand to add to my network as file server for home docs and pics. To my surprise, the seller threw in a Mikrotik router board and a 16p Totolink SG16 unmanaged switch for free as he had no use for it.

Now my ERL3 is fast and appears to be running very stable but the Mikrotik is 19" rack design which fits well in my server rack and from my first readings, this is also a pretty fast router with many options including POE and other options.

Looking for opinions and insights to help me make the right choice.

Many thanks in advance, DD

 

[Trip]

This all comes down to what you're planning to do on the box and how much throughput you require. Before knowing that, throwing out this or that router model as a suggestion is largely pointless. So if you can tell us more specifics, that can help get you the best solution possible.

As a primer, though, the ER-L has been more or less succeeded by the ER-4 (and sister models). They're not much more costly than the ERL was, but provide about 4-5x more CPU-bound throughput when driving non-offloadable traffic (smart queue QoS, OpenVPN, etc.).

 

[ddaenen1]

This all comes down to what you're planning to do on the box and how much throughput you require. Before knowing that, throwing out this or that router model as a suggestion is largely pointless. So if you can tell us more specifics, that can help get you the best solution possible.

As a primer, though, the ER-L has been more or less succeeded by the ER-4 (and sister models). They're not much more costly than the ERL was, but provide about 4-5x more CPU-bound throughput when driving non-offloadable traffic (smart queue QoS, OpenVPN, etc.).

Well, here some pointers:

I currently have a 200/20mbps ISP connection which i am planning to upgrade soon to 400/40mbps and i want a wired router that can support this speed in WAN/LAN throughput. I am not looking for anything fancy, just a solid and stable router which is easy to configure.

With that in mind, i bought an ERL-3 2nd hand but it took my a long time to get it properly set up and running but after several tutorials and trials in a test setup, it is running in my home setup for several weeks and it does seem to do the job well. That being said, i still haven't figured out how to get IPv6 to work and the log shows several errors that i cannot seem to resolve but on the other hand, do not seem to influence performance. I do like the traffic analysis and the ease of static mapping on the ERL-3. I also have UNMS running and it has some nice feature that i appreciate.

As indicated, the Mikrotik was a gift so i now have 2 routers and only need one so i am trying to figure out which one is the keeper. I have made a test setup with the Mikrotik and configuring it up from default was childs-play using the quick config and way easier than the ERL-3, even with the wizards. WAN/LAN throughout seems to be equal to the ERL-3 and it seems to just work, which i like. An advantage to me is that the Mikrotik comes in a 19" rack format which is easier to me than the ERL-3 which i need to put on the tray. What i have not figured out is how to configure syslog for a remote server and if there is a way to get some network analytics on display. Also, i have not tried to configure Ipv6 yet.

 

[coxhaus]

Sounds like you need to make the decision since all of this is free.

 

[ddaenen1]

Sounds like you need to make the decision since all of this is free.

Well, i went with the Mikrotik in the mean time and it does the job perfectly. Maybe the RouterOS GUI doesn't have the fancy graphs that the ERL3 had but configuration has been very easy and it runs like a charm. As a matter a fact, today i bumped into the RB3011UiAS-RM on a local 2nd hand site and i bought it for 50 Euro, a steal. Reason for that is that it has a 1.4GHz dual core with 1Gb RAM instead of the single core 600MHz with 128Mb RAM which translate in 4x WAN2LAN passthrough compared to the RB2011 which i will sell again after i used it in a test set-up to figure out the IPv6 setup and other stuff.