Since last year, I’ve also embarked on some home automation projects.

One can, for example, use this to access Netflix (before Netflix arrived in Singapore), or access other content that has been geo-restricted. Whenever I connect to this Wi-Fi network, I am teleported to the United States. Why do I have another Wi-Fi network? I have this second one permanently connected to a USA VPN service.

I had chosen that over DD-WRT because, at the time I was deciding between the two, only Tomato provided 5 GHz radio support on the E3200. It’s sort of like DD-WRT, but another open source community development. The Linksys software has been replaced by Tomato router. It’s provided through a Linksys EA3200. Again, it’s not quite the normal setup. pfSense provides all the LAN services directly on this primary Wi-Fi network. The Linksys EA8500 is a simple wireless bridge, or what some refer to as Wireless Access Point mode. The pfSense box is the main broadband router. The EA8500 is configured in bridge mode, so it’s not like I have a router being a router. I figured it would provide better Wi-Fi performance than some DIY Wi-Fi hardware. Instead, the main Wi-Fi network at home is provided by a Linksys EA8500 router. I decided not to build Wi-Fi into the DIY pfSense box. StarHub fibre broadband, if you like to know.

Once, the box had three Internet connections. Instead of the typical wireless broadband router that most people plug into their broadband connection, I have a pfSense router. I’ve been using pfSense for many years, and even gone through two generations of a DIY pfSense mini-ITX box. It’s nothing very exotic, though at the same time it isn’t the standard basic broadband router setup that most people have at home. I get asked from time to time what sort of network I have setup at home.

Pfsense wifi access point