[jwhat]

Hi Hamei & Vishnu,

read that article on "home routers" which was a bit alarming...

I am with you Hamei on Cisco, my first permanent internet connection was via IBM 2210 ISDN Router which supported public WAN and behind that I had a dual homed FreeBSD based firewall using TIS application proxys in the firewall (TIS sold their commerical SW as Guantlet) for LAN network.

After that I changed to: Cisco 827 ADSL / Ethernet, then to Cisco 870 ADSL+/Ethernet, then to Cisco 2901 VSDL/Ethernet and now Cisco 4331 Ethernet only.

I thinks the problem here is "What is a router?".

Home "routers" are simple NAT devices and Cisco devices are full blown, fully configurable routers (Static Routes, RIP, OSPF, BGP ... the list goes on)

They can do NAT, but provide way more in routing & security capabilities than any home device, plus the IP Telephony and the multitude of connectivity options.

I only have Ethernet ports on my 4331, as in Australia the "access provider" supplies termination unit with Ethernet interface.

So Vishnu is right that our internet setup are a bit more complicated.

Remember the Internet bubble when Cisco was highest market cap company in the world... all just for sending bits around the worlds networks :-)

Cheers from Oz,

jwhat/John.