Old PC as hardware firewall.

[MWISimmer]

Hi all.
I have a very old PC knocking about and i've just read an article in my favourite weekly PC mag (Micro mart)about "Great uses for an old PC".
One of the options was to turn it into a firewall.
From the mag..

it provides a physically separate and secure barrier between the internet and your PC..

All well and good but how do i do this?
The specs for the (very) old PC is_
Celeron 500MHz processor
64mb PC100 RAM
8gb HDD
Windows 98se.
Would it work? What do i need? Crossover cable, router....
I'm currently on 4meg cable broadband.. the modem is supplied by the ISP.
Any thoughts would be welcome!
Cheers,
Rob.

[Jimbo]

Hey,

Theres a magazine called "Custom PC", available in WHsmiths, available now, and it gives a detailed tutorial on how to set a firewall up on an old pc. You need the issue027/december 2005 edition.

Its quite cool, and guides you through it.

James

[congo]

If you buy a router, then the router becomes the firewall, job done.

If you go through an ICS connection with modem on the old PC, you'll need a crossover cable and 2 lan cards.

You'll have the hassle of setting up and maintaining a network. Personally, I believe if you are that paranoid about the internet, you are better off with a backup, duplicate hard disk used offline, while the other is used online.

The years I spent in online gaming lobbies and general internet use have barely justified the use anything more than a software firewall.

If you have a second hard drive or partition your hard disk and keep all your main programs and data on other partitions than your O/S drive, you'll be plenty safe.

Pension that horrible old PC off or give it to the charity of your choice, or go for it, set up a network (mainly as a learning exercise) and get ready for some problem solving.

[MWISimmer]

Ta Jimbo, i'll look out for it.
Congo, i'm not paranoid, i actually have a very secure (and backed up) main system. It's just i was looking to put it to good use... it's lying in the cupboard doing nothing. I originally got it from my friends work, they were throwing it out, to practise building PC's as i'd never done it before.
I'm also thinking of trying a Linux distro on it, but i'm having problems with burning *iso images to Cd but that's for another forum...
Cheers..  :)
Rob.

[congo]

I just hate working on older systems that's all, I say good riddance to them.

[MWISimmer]

I can understand where you're coming from congo  ;)
I'm learning about PC's all the time and i just needed something "hands on" to practise on... although i don't think i'm quite ready for networking yet!
Everybody in this forum has been very helpful in keeping my interests up, you've all explained things a lot clearer than any magazine or website.
I salute you all  ;)  ;D.
Cheers,
Rob.
P.S. Has anybody seen the_autopilot lately?