Wanted: a Satellite office access box

[Stephen Hodgman]

G'day all,
Well I have searched around and so far cannot find what I want.  So, I 
thought I should throw it open here as what I really want is a linux box in 
an appliance.... let me explain.

The requirement  is for a box to dial (phone network) a central office and 
supply network access to/from the satellite office.  I want no firewall on 
this appliance i.e. I want full access from central office to the satellite 
office computers.  I would like it to provide printing services accessable 
from satellite office and the central office for printer(s) in the satellite 
office.  It should incorporate a hub/switch as well.

Now that is easy you all say.  An old junk PC with linux would do that with 
cpu to spare.  However, the environment is dusty, not secure and I am 
looking for something that is robust, no fan, low cost, easy to configure 
and replace if necessary...

The latest rage seems to be these "Cable Internet Access Routers with 
dial backup".  Well, so far every one of those I have looked at has a 
firewall that does NAT whether you like it or not!  Hence no access from 
central office to satellite office computers/services.

So I am returning to the idea of a junk PC with integrated hub and no hard 
disk and Linux.  Just a boot floppy/cdrom.  Problem is there is still a fan 
and they will break and overheat etc. Or is there another solution that 
anyone can come up with e.g. an "appliance" with no fan that will do it.  I 
need to install four of these pretty soon.

Thanks for your time and help.
---
Stephen Hodgman               steve at namsys.com.au
Namadgi Systems                Ph. +61 2 6285 3460
Canberra                       Fax +61 2 6285 3459
Australia