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I have to recycle an old machine into a networking node for managing TCP/IP connections and PPP protocols ( basically a DSL connection ); I'm not asking for something more than this, all the tasks required are network-related tasks, no computing, just make it like a server.

I was wondering, how do professionals compare 2 different implementations of the TCP/IP stack while having to deal with 2 different OSs ? Like linux and bsd ?

My point is this, there is a unit of measure or a algorithm complexity, or something equivalent to take into account ?

user2485710
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If this is going to be hung off of a DSL connection, your TCP stack isn't going to be a bottleneck. If you were routing to a Gigabit or faster connection, then yes, perhaps it would be beneficial to look into this further.

Generally-speaking, BSDs have a more robust networking stack, but honestly that likely does not matter in your case.

I'd recommend you install pfSense on the server (which is based on FreeBSD) and be done with it. It will likely do everything you need and much more.

EEAA
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  • +1 Until you get into the niche requirements, they're all close enough. – Chris S May 27 '14 at 16:59
  • thanks for that name, I forgot about pfSense, but my question still is about why the 2 differs ? Why you can say that the BSD stack is better ? – user2485710 May 28 '14 at 07:34
  • Your question is like asking why an apple is different than an orange. The Linux kernel and the FreeBSD kernel are two completely different code bases. – EEAA May 28 '14 at 11:58