Hallo Jesse,

Jesse Guardiani schrieb am 04. March 2005:

>>To me FBSD is going into the same direction Linux has already gone.
>>Old unix virtues like stability are sacrificed (...)

>I don't see 4.x as being the rock of reliability

It's (IMHO) much better than the 5.x branch. Although (as I said
above) FBSD is going into the same direction as Linux. 

>I have a 4.x machine that crashes every few months or so even without
>high load.

That's the main reason why I chose OpenBSD.

>I have a linux machine that is just as reliable as my production 4.x
>machine. The uptimes are comparable.

Which only proves my point (see above). FBSD and Linux are (IMHO) not
the most stable unixoid Operating Systems and (again IMHO) not ideal
for a router platform. However OpenBSD's security policy and features
like pf (there is a reason why it's ported to other BSDs) and CARP
should make it a favourite for embedded router platforms.

>I think what you have to realize is the incredible amount of complexity
>these OS's deal with

I am sorry, but there is no excuse for crashes/freezes. That might be
okay for Desktop machines, might be normal in Mickysoft's small world,
but it's unworthy of a unixoid OS.

Sure I can reboot m0n0wall via cronjob every two days, but this is
just lame.

>I don't push a massive amount of traffic across my 4801 (maxed out T1),
>but mine is far from unreliable. Have you tried a different 4801?

I bought a WRAP and disabled the cronjob. Although a hardware fault of
the Soekris seems unlikely, I cannot exclude it. I'll see how long the
WRAP keeps running.

>Production lines are fairly reliable usually, but they do produce bad
>batches from time to time.

You are right: one cannot be sure whether the hardware has some kind
of flaw. Since there seem to be not many freezes, it really might be a
problem on my side.

Thanks for your response and kind regards

Frederick