Messages

1

24.1 Legacy Series / Re: changing IP address of OPNsense

« on: April 08, 2024, 06:04:39 pm »

I would agree with JonM that most consumer grade devices don't come with a static IP address of 192.168.1.1 outside of consumer routers.  If for some reason you are setting up one of these devices, you should really connect to those directly and change the appropriate settings (like turning off DHCP services) before you attempt to connect it to your regular network (perhaps as a WiFi AP point for example). 

Most consumer devices are generally going to be set up to get a DHCP assigned IP address which means they should automatically get a valid address assigned when they connect to the network the first time.  Depending on which VLAN they are connected to will dictate what IP address range they are assigned to.

If you find yourself using a device that has a factory assigned static IP address in the 192.168.1.1/24 range, you can simply connect it to your main network (no VLAN) and you should be able to connect to it that way.  Since the OPNsense firewall is the only device on the 192.168.1.1/24 subnet, there shouldn't be any issue with duplicate addresses.

If you find yourself working with a lot of devices that are factory assigned static IP addresses outside of the 192.168.1.1/24 subnet that your network is already using, you can always create a VLAN specific for that use.  For example, 192.168.0.1/24 seems to be another popular consumer grade subnet, so you could always create a new VLAN using the subnet to connect these devices to initially to change their settings to whatever you want to use long term.  Then unplug them from this "setup" VLAN and connect them to the VLAN they will be associated with long term.   

Personally I'll generally connect directly with a new device using my laptop however and just manually set the device up to function like I want (IP address or otherwise) prior to connecting it to  my home network.  This way I know there aren't going to be any issues.

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24.1 Legacy Series / Re: Automatic Firmware Updates

« on: April 08, 2024, 05:44:40 pm »

While I would never set up my router to auto update, I can also understand why someone would. 

I don't do it because there is always a chance that the update will break something and bring my whole network down.  Given that I am away from my house most of the day, this would be very annoying for everyone that is still at home.

However, the odds that a bug would bring down the network are relatively low, and if someone worked from home or was otherwise around to fix issues when they arose, having updates automatically applied would be convenient. 

3

General Discussion / Re: Locked after connect the PC in another LAN

« on: April 04, 2024, 08:13:31 pm »

Are you sure the different LANs are set up correctly with regard to IP addresses.  You say only one of the three is set up to use DHCP.  I would suggest that you turn DHCP "on" on all three LAN segments.  I suspect there is an issue either in your network segmentation address scheme (your LANs are overlapping addresses for example), or with IP address assigned (or not assigned) to the NIC of your computer you are tying to connect.  By turning on DHCP, this will correct both issues. 

You need to simplify things to ensure they work correctly.  If you later want to "complicate" things by turning off DHCP on some of the network segments, at least you know why it stops functioning.

4

General Discussion / Re: LAN Traffic & Bandwidth to Opnsense

« on: April 04, 2024, 07:15:45 pm »

If you don't use VLANs, then all of your "routing" is handled at the switch level.  This means the only traffic that should be crossing through the firewall is data going to/from the internet connection.  Since your internet connection is slower than a 2.5gb connection, the difference between using a 10gb and 2.5gb between the firewall and switch is really not going to make a difference.

If you decide to switch to using VLANs (managed by OPNsense), traffic on the same VLAN will continue to be routed at the switch level.  Only traffic that needs to cross over from one VLAN to another will have to traverse to the firewall.  So even if you decide to add VLANs in the future, if you just take some time to ensure that data will travel on the same VLAN as much as possible and only cross over to another VLAN in rare occasions, you will likely still be fine using the 2.5gb connection between switch and firewall.

That being said, you don't mention the speeds of the normal ports on your network switch, but I suspect they are 10/100/1000.  This means that the real speed limitation on your network is currently with your switch, not the connection between the firewall and switch.  My recommendations above are assuming that all of your network devices are connected to the switch and nothing else is connected to the firewall (other than WAN and switch connections).

If you do have devices that can connect at faster speeds, you might want to connect those devices directly to the firewall's 2.5gb ports and then connect the firewall to the switch using the 10gb connection to ensure the fastest possible speeds should there be max throughput on several firewall ports at the same time.  In that case, using the 10gb connection between the firewall and switch could make a difference in overall network speed.

Hopefully that makes sense!

5

General Discussion / Re: Advice accepted for new configuration

« on: April 04, 2024, 06:42:17 pm »

Tom,

You seem to be just beginning your network journey.  As such, I would like to know why you think you need a DMZ?  While DMZs are not unheard of, they are kind of out of the ordinary for a typical home network.  I just want to get some clarity on your use case because it might be something you think you need, but really don't.

6

Tutorials and FAQs / Re: Can not reach other LAN participants through opnsense

« on: November 14, 2023, 09:35:47 pm »

Any particular reason you feel the need to run two DHCP servers (one in OPNsense and one in the Wireless AP)?  To keep it simple, you should really just run one on the OPNsense device.  Any device connecting to the wireless AP will still be issued a DHCP address from the firewall.  Hopefully the two current servers are handing out addresses in different subnets, but that still raises complexity to the system that really isn't needed.  If the two servers are handing out addresses that can overlap with each other, then you will really have problems.

7

23.1 Legacy Series / Re: VLANs and 2 switches - Can you aggregate interfaces?

« on: April 24, 2023, 03:54:47 pm »

Thanks for everyone's help with this.  I utilized the stacking capability of the Brocade switches and it works great. Being a non-professional and having zero experience with stacking, I thought it was going to be a challenge for me to accomplish because I was expecting to have to do a lot of the switch configuration manually.  In the end, all I really had to do was connect the two switches together correctly and then initiate the stacking setup on the "primary" switch.  It found the second switch and set both switches up in the stack automatically.  It couldn't have been easier to do!

8

23.1 Legacy Series / Re: Internet bound traffic blocked on LAN

« on: April 24, 2023, 03:38:09 pm »

I would suggest that you change the "from LAN network" to "any" in both of your rules, making it a true Allow All type of rule.

9

23.1 Legacy Series / Re: VLANs and 2 switches - Can you aggregate interfaces?

« on: April 20, 2023, 05:41:17 pm »

I think trying to stack the switches is going to be the best option.  I currently run an Aruba S2500-48p in my current network.  I also have a second Aruba S2500-24-p at my parents house that I could "swap" and use at my house if needed.

I have purchased a Brocade ICX6610-48 and a ICX6450-48p as well.  I have come to learn that those two units will "stack" to some degree, but apparently there are some limitations in the way Brocade handles the stacking of these two models.  Honestly I wasn't even sure they would stack together at all due to being different models.

I am currently only using LVANs (L2) on my Aruba switch and I have no idea the advanced capabilities of that switch, although I do know it supports stacking with like models so I should have no problem stacking the S2500s together.

Any suggestions as to which set of switches I should use?  I guess I am leaning towards the Brocade since it is the easiest to try out without disrupting my current network.

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23.1 Legacy Series / VLANs and 2 switches - Can you aggregate interfaces?

« on: April 20, 2023, 12:30:05 am »

I have set up OPNsense in a lab environment to try out.  I have a situation I need to figure out before I can roll it out to my home network.  I have two network switches - both managed.  I have multiple VLANs set up.  I have three different wireless access points spread around my home that run multiple SSIDs for most of the VLANs.  All of the APs will be plugged into one switch.  I have some wireless networks that are assigned to VLANs that will be handled by the second switch.  Therefore I need to be able to access some of the VLANs on both switches.

I'd like to attach each switch directly to my OPNsense device via 10gb SFP+ ports (the firewall has two of those ports available).  Since OPNsense assigns VLANs to interfaces, and it doesn't seem possible to assign an interface to more than one network port, what are my options?  Is it possible through some sort of aggregation option?

I realize one answer is to run the firewall to the first switch and then the first switch to the second switch, but that seems to waste bandwidth of the 1st switch unnecessarily.  A second answer is to use the layer 3 functionality of my switches and take the VLAN assignment away from OPNsense.  I may go this route but will need to set up a DHCP server on the network as well as set up rules in the switches.  That's certainly possible (and probably the most "professional" answer), but I'm hoping for a simpler solution.

Hopefully this question makes sense.  I'm not an IT professional, so I might not be using the correct terminology to describe my situation.  Thanks for the help!

11

General Discussion / Re: Mellanox ConnectX-2 and up

« on: April 13, 2023, 03:03:17 pm »

I just wanted to say thank you for posting this information.  I just installed one of these cards in my OPNsense device and it saved me a lot of headaches!

12

Hardware and Performance / Re: Smart Managed Switch: Cisco or Zyxel

« on: April 05, 2023, 10:41:15 pm »

Neither.  Right now I would look at some of the many Brocade switches being sold on EBay.  Check this thread out for more information.  https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/brocade-icx-series-cheap-powerful-10gbe-40gbe-switching.21107/

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Tutorials and FAQs / Re: Convert PFsense DHCP static addresses via regex

« on: March 20, 2023, 09:09:38 pm »

I'm currently trying OPNsense in a lab setting and considering making the change myself.  This will come in handy.  Thanks for posting!

14

Tutorials and FAQs / Re: Changing IP on a public network with OpenVPN?

« on: March 20, 2023, 09:07:53 pm »

Your family will just need to know the public IP address so they can access the OpenVPN.  If your public IP address will change over time (many internet providers will change their "residential" client's public IP addresses from time to time to prevent them from hosting servers that are really meant for business customers), then you will need to use a "Dynamic DNS" service (free or paid).  This service will issue you a domain name (perhaps "ohara.dyndns.com")and you give that domain name to your family instead of your actual public address.  Even if your public IP address changes, the DDND service will automatically forward anything from "ohara.dyndns.com" to whatever you current public IP address happens to be.  This ensures people can access your VPN connection - even if your public IP address changes periodically.

15

Virtual private networks / Re: WG handshake not completing when using 2nd router behind opnsense

« on: March 17, 2023, 08:54:16 pm »

I'm not sure if this is the only problem, but it doesn't look like you have added the 192.168.0.1 network as an allowable network in the wireguard set up.