VPN Bandwidth Usage

[jon]

I'm a Managed Service Provider, and I'm interested in bandwidth usage over OpenVPN using Untangle. Particularly, how much bandwidth does it normally use for the applications to run? I know it all depends on how much web usage is going through the server, but I need a rough estimate on what to expect.

Right now our target market is home users and small business users. We plan on implementing the web filter and possibly a few others like identity theft protection, spyware blocker, firewall, and intrusion protection.

Also, as I understand it, with OpenVPN, I will be able to see logs pertaining to each individual user, not just networks, right? If they're behind a router, I'll be able to control and view logs for VPN users behind the router individually, right?

Thanks in advance!

Jonathon

[richie]

it depends on what application they use (i.e video streaming, huge file transfer ) and how many concurrent users.

on a 1663 / 637 kbps connection ( on main site ) i was able to download 1 mb file in about 10 sec. and i'm the only user connected on openvpn.

you will be able to see user sessions on the event logs.

hope this helps.

[jon]

Do you know of a good rule of thumb for having 50+ users remotely connected via VPN? Maybe like x amount of bandwidth up and x amount down per x users?

Bandwidth doesn't make a difference when you have multiple applications set up for a user does it? (For example, web filtering and spam & phishing blocking added on)

[dmorris]

I'm not sure I understand what performance metric you're asking about, but here are my thoughts

If you're running the untangle server through a good box - the encryption overhead won't be the limiting factor (your upstream bandwidth probably will be). OpenVPN encryption/decryption is efficient (its SSL).
On a good box you could do this and run the applications with no problems.

If you have 50 users on the VPN all downloading, you'll run out of upstream bandwidth before you get a lot of load on the box.
(in the beta Mustang release you can verify this by simply dropping to shell and monitoring the load on the box)

Does this help?

[jon]

That's what I'm trying to figure out - how much upstream & downstream I would need on average per user. I wasn't sure if running other applications would also tie up bandwidth usage.