NME-NAC-K9
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The NME-NAC-K9 is a service module for Cisco 2800 and 3800 routers. (A "service module," in Cisco parlance, is a card for a router that, instead of providing interfaces, provides some sort of other service.) This line card was designed to be a server for the Cisco NAC solution, and its job would be to act as a captive portal and security assessment tool for network clients.
Contents
Why it's interesting
Hardware wise, this is effectively a self-contained server. Some hardware information is provided by Cisco. It has a 1GHz Celeron M processor (which does not seem replaceable). The CPU does not support 64-bit instructions. It shipped with an 80GB SATA hard disk, a 64MB CompactFlash card, and 512MB of small form factor ECC RAM, and all of those parts *do* seem replaceable.
The Cisco NAC software is based on a modified Fedora Core 4 distribution, which is to say that it's pretty old at this point.
[root@MPHC-NME-2 work]# uname -a Linux MPHC-NME-2 2.6.11-perfigo #1 Tue Dec 11 12:17:50 PST 2007 i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux
(By the way, "perfigo" is Cisco NAC's name before Cisco acquired it.)
Hardware hacks
Replacing the memory
The RAM is ECC, even though it looks like laptop RAM. However, if you remove five screws on top of the grounding pads, remove two small screws on the front panel, and pull the top PCB straight upward, the two PCBs will separate and you can replace the RAM. I had a NME-WAE-522-K9 I bought before I knew it wouldn't boot in a Cisco 2821. I pulled its 2GB RAM stick and it works fine in the NME-NAC-K9, even with the NAC software still installed.
Replacing the hard disk
Once you have followed the same steps as above to remove the top PCB, the four screws securing the bottom of the 2.5" SATA HDD to the PCB are accessible. Preliminary results show that the 160GB disk from the NME-WAE-522-K9 does work, but I haven't tried any third-party 2.5" SATA disks, nor any SSDs.
Replacing the CF card
My unit came with a genuine Cisco card, but general wisdom says that no Cisco product actually requires a Cisco-branded card. I haven't tested this, nor how large the card can be, but it appears as /dev/hda in the NAC OS, so it could be useful to swap this out for a larger one.
