Smallest Firewall / Router VM (FreeSCO) For Your Home Lab (Image Size 1.4MB & Only Need RAM 16MB)

In my home lab virtual environment, VMware ESXi and Workstation used to host most of my testing virtual machines. To get those VMs working together in a multi networks diagram, I always need to have a router or firewall VM. I were using all kinds of virtual routers or firwealls, such as those major vendors, Cisco, CheckPoint, Juniper, Fortinet, Palo Alo, also some small vendors, such as OpenWRT,PFsense, RouterOS, etc. But recent I found one small Virtual image surprised me. The whole virtual image file is only 1.4MB. Memory only needs 16MB.

 Booting menu

Diagram

Internet <------>(Public IP)Home Router(192.168.2.1) <------>192.168.2.x/24 network <------> (192.168.2.20)FreeSCO (192.168.111.3) <------> 192.168.111.x/24 network<------>Windows Test Machine(192.168.111.111)

 Some of Freesco’s abilities:

• Simple bridge
• Firewalling and NAT
• Dialup, leased line, DSL and cable router
• Time, DHCP, DNS, HTTP server
• Remote access server
• Print server
• Supports up to three Ethernet/arcnet/token_ring/arlan NICs
• and two modems

 

VMWare Configuration

Login System

After imported into VMWare Workstation, power it on, you will see following login window:

After all interface configured:

Default Login: root

Default Password: Welcome1

Enter a name and country code. you will be placed into console. 

      _/_/_/_/ _/_/_/_/  _/_/_/_/ _/_/_/_/ _/_/_/_/ _/_/_/_/ _/_/_/_/
     _/       _/     _/ _/       _/       _/       _/       _/    _/  v0.4.5
    _/_/_/   _/_/_/_/  _/_/_/   _/_/_/   _/_/_/_/ _/       _/    _/   Powered
   _/       _/  _/    _/       _/             _/ _/       _/    _/      by
  _/       _/    _/  _/_/_/_/ _/_/_/_/ _/_/_/_/ _/_/_/_/ _/_/_/_/      LiNUX


        Registering your system is NOT required and the system will run
        perfectly without registering, but it is helpful in accurately
        counting the number of systems running FREESCO. No personal
        information is needed except for a name to register the system
        with. Once registered this prompt will never appear again.

Register your system now (y/n)? [y]

Registration name? freesco1
Your two letter country code? US
error: HTTP error from server: HTTP/1.1 500 Internal Server Error
Error
ile rev 2.7freesco
[root@freesco]

Setup Interface

Use ssh client to log in this small router. 

Type Setup then enter:

Choose h) Local networks, 

For Netwrok #0 , which is WAN network . Configure static ip address 192.168.2.20 / 24 with gateway 192.168.2.1. 

For eth0, by default, it is DHCP client enabled, which means you will get ip address from your DHCP server, ususually it is your home router.

Then configuration network #1 (LAN interface) to use eth1 with static ip address 192.168.111.3/24.

Press x to ext and save the configuration. 

You will be prompted to restart the sytem. 

Type reboot to restart it. 

Web interface

ssh:

root / Welcome1

http://<IP>

http://<IP>:82

Username : admin

Password : Welcome1     

Network configuraiton:

Configure Home Router (Not FreeSCO) to Return Traffic to LAB Network Behind FreeSCO

By default your Home Router does not know where is 192.168.111.x network. To get your home router (192.168.2.1) to return traffic back to FreeSCO, you will need to add a static route like below:

Or, we can configure our FreeSCO to enable NAT/Firewall. 

On/Off NAT Firewall Mode:

DNS Configuration

Configure server - Server Settings from Advanced Configuraiton

Reboot system after setting changed. 

Youtube Video

A video I created long time ago (Jul 2018) to show you the whole process and it is still valid: 

Client Configuration & Performance Test

For other network, for example 192.168.2.x/255.255.255.0 , to access 192.168.111.x network, you might need to add a specific route if you don't have a static route added into your home router.

For windows:

• route add 192.168.111.0 mask 255.255.255.0 192.168.2.20 -p
• route add 192.168.111.0 mask 255.255.255.0 192.168.2.20 

To delete:

• route delete 192.168.111.0

Performance Test

On the machine 192.168.111.23, run iperf as server: iperf.exe -s

PS C:\Users\netse\OneDrive\Desktop\iperf-3.1.3-win64> tracert 192.168.111.23

Tracing route to 192.168.111.23 over a maximum of 30 hops

  1    <1 ms     1 ms    <1 ms  192.168.2.1
  2     1 ms    <1 ms    <1 ms  192.168.2.20
  3     1 ms     1 ms     1 ms  192.168.111.23

Trace complete.
PS C:\Users\netse\OneDrive\Desktop\iperf-3.1.3-win64> .\iperf3.exe -c 192.168.111.23
Connecting to host 192.168.111.23, port 5201
[  4] local 192.168.2.89 port 62688 connected to 192.168.111.23 port 5201
[ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bandwidth
[  4]   0.00-1.00   sec  19.9 MBytes   167 Mbits/sec
[  4]   1.00-2.00   sec  21.8 MBytes   183 Mbits/sec
[  4]   2.00-3.00   sec  22.1 MBytes   185 Mbits/sec
[  4]   3.00-4.01   sec  11.1 MBytes  92.1 Mbits/sec
[  4]   4.01-5.00   sec  8.88 MBytes  75.5 Mbits/sec
[  4]   5.00-6.00   sec  14.8 MBytes   124 Mbits/sec
[  4]   6.00-7.00   sec  14.1 MBytes   118 Mbits/sec
[  4]   7.00-8.00   sec  18.2 MBytes   153 Mbits/sec
[  4]   8.00-9.01   sec  17.2 MBytes   144 Mbits/sec
[  4]   9.01-10.00  sec  14.5 MBytes   123 Mbits/sec
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bandwidth
[  4]   0.00-10.00  sec   163 MBytes   136 Mbits/sec                  sender
[  4]   0.00-10.00  sec   163 MBytes   136 Mbits/sec                  receiver

iperf Done.
PS C:\Users\netse\OneDrive\Desktop\iperf-3.1.3-win64>

It looks like at least it will support 136Mbits/sec. Not a perfect testing environment, but it should be able to support my home lab for testing. 

Software Download link

https://od.51sec.org/TGM_51Sec_EU/Sharing/VM/Router%20Images/

References

• https://www.freesco.org/
• FreeSCO: Build A Router With A 386 And A Floppy Disk