Mini PC to use with FreeBSD

E

England

I am a newbie here and have not used FreeBSD at all. I guess you have to start somewhere and after reading many of your posts I find I am not yet familar with all the acronyms and jargon. To the point I want to load a mini PC with FreeBSD to create a File and Database Server to use locally, but, of course be on the internet. This would hopefully reduce the hundreds of dollars paid to a Hosting provider storing my SQLite DB. To start, I have looked at many mini PC's and have identified Venoen M5 i9 9880H (8 cores 16 threads) 2.36G CPU 16G RAM 256G SSD as a possible unit or perhaps an Intel Mini PC 8G RAM 256G SSI using a Celeron N5105 4 cores 2.96G CPU NUC11ATKC4. Before I jump into this I wanted any comments on what the members might recommend to use, that has had no problems with using FreeBSD. I think this is where to start to avoid the response "you should have asked first before you purchased".
 
To the moderator....I pressed the prefix saying solved. Was not sure what the prefix meant? sorry
 
England said:
but, of course be on the internet. This would hopefully reduce the hundreds of dollars paid to a Hosting provider storing my SQLite DB
Click to expand...
I'm assuming you are willing to take on the responsibility of exposing a system to the internet at whole? Hosting providers typically do a lot more than give you a space.
You putting this up at your home? Does your current/future ISP allow you to do this? It may seem like a minor point, but legal issues aren't a whole lot of fun.
You prepared to take care of firewalling to only allow what you want?
You prepared to take care of monitoring your system 24/7 to be sure it isn't misused?
You prepared to follow all the security sources and keep your system up to data on the latest exploits?
You prepared to deal with your system being hijacked and used as a jumping off point to DOS another system? Legal troubles following from this?

At a first glance sure either of those systems would probably be fine but you really haven't said anything that would give anyone a clue as to the anticipated load. I mean just because one could use Windows95 doesn't mean one should.

So you may want to expand on the use cases if you want to get any kind of reasonable input.
 
Thanks It appears I have lots to think about. Your very first question is a good one. I will check whether my ISP will allow any kind of hosting. Perhaps I could respond to you again after thinking this through
 
Just further thinking about what you said. I did quite a bit of reading on OpenWRT and FreeBSD and it appears the latter has several flavours of Firewall configurations. I was really keen to explore with this forums help but like you said there are other issues to be concerned with. It would be setup at my home.
 
A book I've had on my shelf a long time that may help understand a lot:
"Building Internet Firewalls" by D. Brent Chapman and Elizabeth D. Zwicky.

Not sure if it's still in print or if you can get your hands on a copy but it goes through a lot of the basics and helps understand why "hosting is hard"

Native firewalls on FreeBSD I would lean towards "PF"; it started from OpenBSD, the FreeBSD version is a little different but it's well supported.
 
for low to moderate load don't bother with self hosting, it's not worth the trouble
just use a vm provider
it may seem more expensive because the costs are easier to figure out but saves you a lot of trouble like
power/ups, hardware failing, isp down, you cable/fiber gets cut by construction workers, etc
you isp changes you ip address because reasons
your isp fscks the reverse resolving of your ip and you can't reach anybody who can fix it
your isp suddenly starts to filter random ports as somehow they think you have a vanilla residential contract
you are not in the office and have to do something in single user mode, the box won't boot (most vms permit accessing preboot via a web console or other means)
isp may offer you a business contract / fixed ip addr / "guaranteed bandwidth" which in my experience cost a lot more and works a lot worse than a cheap residential contract
 
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The requirements here are a little bbit vague - so basicaly the OP wants to have a machine to store a Sqlite file on. Since it is Sqlite, it cannot be too much on the heavy duty side either.

Way to go would be a small virtual server somewhere with Postgres installed probably.
 
mer, covacat and hardworkingnewbie
1 - I have discussed the issue of "hosting" with my ISP and there are no issues as long as I leave their front end equipment in place which has their brand of firewalling in place. However I would bridge the rest of their router/modem to a new WiFi and File Server. The current WiFi from the ISP is very poor and very low milliwatts delivery.
2 - I am willing to take full responsibility for the hosting setup. It would NOT have to run 24/7 and if it crashes or there are issues, this does not bother me.
3 - I want to do this little server project because its on my "bucket" list and challenging. I want to learn from this exercise. That's why I joined this group of knowledgeable individuals who have resolved many issues using FreeBSD.

4- In my studies I never heard of Postgres(SQL) and after googling the word was surprised it was a database similar to Sqlite. However the database I have, has been developed for a number of years and so I would stick with what I am familar with at this time.
5 - I am also developing a simple website to show the latest sensors in robotics which will hopefully be available on-line. I will see how things progress,

I welcome your comments.
 
England said:
Postgres(SQL) and after googling the word was surprised it was a database similar to Sqlite.
Click to expand...
They both use Structured Query Language and they're both a relational database, but that's pretty much where the similarities end. If you are familiar with SQL then you shouldn't have a problem learning to use some other RDBMS.

As for hardware, look around ebay or similar. There are plenty of small form factor PCs for sale, all second hand (refurbished) enterprise stuff which can be bought for cheap. HP, Lenovo, Dell. Any one of these would easily fit your initial requirements. You can start with those, and buy something bigger later on.
 
#1 I personally would add a firewalling device immediately after the ISP equipment that is under your control.
#3 is the best reason to do anything; "because I want to". I never discourage anyone from doing something they want to, just want to make sure they are aware of as many gotchas/other things.
#5 is simple to say, lots of little bits to keep track of. One of the first things to think of is DNS: if it's available to the general public a DNS entry translating "myrobiticssensors.org" to an IP address (IPV6/IPV4) that leads back to your http server. Sometimes the ISP/hosting will provide that, but you need to think about it.

So going back to your first post, that hardware is probably fine for what you want :)

My opinions, based on me being paranoid:
Be very paranoid about security and separation. Research firewalling, DMZs, hosting. If you can find a copy of the book I referenced in #7 grab it. It's not product specific, it was a while ago, but the fundamentals are solid. Don't host your database on the same system you use for firewalling or your personal desktop with banking information.
Learn and embrace "Default Deny" (mostly firewall rules, but really applies to everything)
Make sure the path from the external service to your internal network is under your control and one can't compromise your external service and get to your internal system that has your banking information.
 
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