Agreed that these are pretty low-level issues - even testing w/ a separate PCIe controller didn't help much. For routing and hackability I'd go w/ a Mikrotik R

Agreed that these are pretty low-level issues - even testing w/ a separate PCIe controller didn't help much. For routing and hackability I'd go w/ a Mikrotik RouterBoard, or for pure price/performance (and a really polished UI), I'd go w/ Ubiquiti's Edge Routers.