8-port 2.5GbE Intel Core Virtualization and Firewall Appliance Mini-Review

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8-Port Intel Core Firewall and Virtualization Appliance Internal Hardware Overview

Taking off the main chassis, we can see the eight ports arranged together on two different PCBs.

Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall Network Port Side Top Removed
Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall Network Port Side Top Removed

One big feature is the CPU heatsink that we can see on the bottom of the main motherboard. In the last review, we saw how this has thermal paste that helps interface the heatsink to the chassis.

The key in the system is the riser to give that second level of four 2.5GbE ports.

Topton 4x 2.5GbE 2x 10GbE NAS And 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall PCIe X4 Riser
Topton 4x 2.5GbE 2x 10GbE NAS And 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall PCIe X4 Riser

In that riser is a card with four Intel i226-V NICs onboard. What is strange about this is that this is a custom form factor where the ports are in-line with the connector.

Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall 4x 2.5GbE Card With Heatsinks
Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall 4x 2.5GbE Card With Heatsinks

We had to see what was under those heatsinks. Here we can see the four Intel i226-V NICs as well as an ASMedia PCIe switch.

Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall 4x 2.5GbE Card Without Heatsinks 2
Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall 4x 2.5GbE Card Without Heatsinks 2

The ASMedia ASM1812 is a PCIe Gen2 switch. What is fascinating about this design is that this is a custom card with an extra component. It seems strange that this could have been done at a lower power and cost by just using PCIe bifurcation.

Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall 4x 2.5GbE Card Without Heatsinks 1
Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall 4x 2.5GbE Card Without Heatsinks 1

Here is the other side of the inside of the chassis with the riser and card installed.

Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall USB Port Side Top Removed
Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall USB Port Side Top Removed

Taking the riser out we can see the barebones motherboard the CW-NAS-6. This is the same motherboard model number, despite having a different CPU, as the SFP+ system we reviewed earlier.

Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall Internal Barebones
Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall Internal Barebones

We ordered a configured unit, so we got a 256GB Fanxiang S500 Pro SSD and Yue Tiger 16GB DDR4-3200 SODIMM installed.

Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall Fanxiang S500 Pro 256GB And Yue Tiger 16GB DDR4 SODIMM
Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall Fanxiang S500 Pro 256GB And Yue Tiger 16GB DDR4 SODIMM

Here is what the configured unit looks like.

Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall Internal Configured
Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall Internal Configured

The other strange aspect of this motherboard is that it is the CW-NAS-6 motherboard clearly designed for a NAS with six SATA III ports onboard.

Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall SATA
Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall SATA

The PICe slot where the riser installs is in the middle of the motherboard seemingly for another application as well.

Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall Dual DDR4 SODIMM Slots
Topton 8x 2.5GbE Router Firewall Dual DDR4 SODIMM Slots

Next, let us get to the performance.

2 COMMENTS

  1. Recently a similar system that crashed with GeekBench 6 was reviewed. Since the crashes occur ar “different parts of the multi-threaded test” rather than always in the same place this is likely a hardware malfunction. Also, the hardware malfunction seems to result from the design as both the earlier and present units experienced the same instability.

    My conclusion would be GeekBench 6 is more stressful than stress-ng and that the hardware is flawed.

    Is it possible to underclock the i7 processor or memory to the point GeekBench 6 works?

  2. New models with updated processor are avaible now. Considering how a core 10 series is doing, It would be interesting how a 12th or 13th gen would do.

    But most importantly, this unit can have a LAN extension board, or a dual sfp+ extension board. Since the riser should be a PCIe2 4x, the maximum throughput of the riser should be of 2gbit/s per direction (correct me if I’m wrong and it is a newser PCIE version please, I don’t know for sure!). It means that should be almost ok to use both port for input/output in homes where the fiber arrive at 2.5gbit/s because it can do 4gbit/s in/out, because you lose 500mbit/s per direction. But what about using a 10gbit/s connection? Or all four 10gbit/s LAN ports?

    It would be intresting a network test to see if this unit bottleneck!

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