Vyatta is open source based software that provides for the customer several networking functions, including routing, DHCP address management, VPN connectivity, WAN link load balancing, and more. The software itself is offered in both free Community Editions (downloadable from the vendor's Web site as well as Vyatta.org), and in subscription-based commercial versions available from the vendor themselves. The key difference between the two primarily focus on support and updates: The commercial versions include direct support (in varying levels) from the vendor, access to customer hot fixes, and hardware testing/certification. Support through the Community Edition is primarily forum/community driven with no hardware certifications.

The Commercial product lines are offered in both software (the product can be run directly off of a CD, or loaded onto a dedicated partition of an existing drive--the distribution CD includes an installer script) and in pre-loaded hardware appliances. The software supports loading on 32-bit x86 architectures, with multiple potential interfaces (including 10/100/1000 and 10 Gig) listed as supported.

Functional capabilities of the product include support for IPv4, BGPv4, RIPv2, and static routing; static or DHCP addressing (as a server, client, or relay); WAN link load balancing; QoS services; NAT; a stateful inspection firewall; IPSec VPN (DES/3DES/AES); 802.1Q VLANs; RADIUS authentication or individual accounts/passwords; support for Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol (VRRP); and CLI based management, among other features (the vendor states that a GUI management interface is expected in Q3/2008). The Vyatta.org site states that the software is "... an integration of a number of components from a variety of different sources," all defined as open source but potentially carrying different licenses (GNU GPL and BSD are specifically listed).

Pre-loaded appliances offered by the vendor include the Vyatta 514, with a 1 GHz processor, four 10/100 ports, 512 MB memory (upgradeable to 1 GB), and a single PCI-32 expansion slot enabling support for interfaces including 10/100/1000, ADSL, and T1/E1; and the new 2501, with a 1.8 GHz processor, dual 10/100/1000 ports, 512 MB memory, and both PCI-X (64bit, 133 MHz) and PCIe expansion slots.

The Vyatta product line is available now; the new 2501 with a starting price of $2,347.

Visit the Vyatta Web site for further information.