WAN connection drops - BT HG612

[henryp]

Hi Guys,
Wondering if I could have some help. I've just got OPNsense working and it was all going well but for some reason it will just drop the WAN connection, the internet works perfectly until it drops the connection.
I know the HG612 I'm using is good because I've used it with a BT HomeHub without any issues.

I'm hoping this is just a config issue! thanks for your help 

[bartjsmit]

Any logs? Does the WAN go red in the dashboard interface link?

Does OPNsense establish the PPPoE tunnel? Which DNS servers do you have configured on the firewall?

Bart...

[henryp]

Thanks Bart,
Yes the WAN connection shows red when the internet stops working.
Can I check the logs even after the system has restarted? I've had to swap to another router to use the internet.

Thanks again 

[bartjsmit]

Have a trawl through /var/log/ppp.log

Bart...

[henryp]

Thanks Bart,
The logs are pretty much just this:

Code: [Select]

Aug 31 20:14:26 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] Link: DOWN event
Aug 31 20:14:26 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] LCP: Down event
Aug 31 20:14:26 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] Link: reconnection attempt 419 i                                                                                                             n 2 seconds
Aug 31 20:14:28 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] Link: reconnection attempt 419
Aug 31 20:14:28 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] PPPoE: Connecting to ''
Aug 31 20:14:37 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] PPPoE connection timeout after 9                                                                                                              seconds
Aug 31 20:14:37 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] Link: DOWN event
Aug 31 20:14:37 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] LCP: Down event
Aug 31 20:14:37 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] Link: reconnection attempt 420 i                                                                                                             n 4 seconds
Aug 31 20:14:41 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] Link: reconnection attempt 420
Aug 31 20:14:41 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] PPPoE: Connecting to ''
Aug 31 20:14:51 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] PPPoE connection timeout after 9                                                                                                              seconds
Aug 31 20:14:51 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] Link: DOWN event
Aug 31 20:14:51 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] LCP: Down event
Aug 31 20:14:51 Sycamores-RT01 ppp: [wan_link0] Link: reconnection attempt 421 i 

I don't know if this helps at all, I probably don't have something setup correctly but i'm not sure what..

Henry

[bartjsmit]

Hi Henry,

Can you post your hardware details? Especially the chipset of the network card for your WAN interface.

Are you using the same ethernet cable you used with the BT hub?

Bart...

[henryp]

Hi Bart,
I'm unsure of the exact chipset that i'm using for the WAN but I do know its a Realtec one.
I use a Intel Gigabit PRO 1000CT with the 82574L Chipset for my LAN.
I have a Cat6 ethernet cable going from the HG612 to the OPNsense box (bit of an overkill  ) but its the same one that I've  used with my HomeHub router and its working fine  .

Some other hardware details:
Intel Core i3 4th Generation
4GB RAM
128GB SSD

Thanks Again !

[bartjsmit]

Hi Henry,

There has traditionally been a dark cloud over Realtek drivers in FreeBSD. Any chance you could swap the interfaces to see if that keeps the WAN side up longer?

As well as trying that, you can pare OPNsense down to its bare minimum; firewall with IPv4 outbound NAT and port forward for the inbound traffic you absolutely need. No Suricata, DNS, Netflow, etc.

Run in this smallest possible footprint and see if that stops the dropouts. If it does, you have a baseline you can compare to when you start adding stuff back in.

Bart...

[henryp]

Ok thanks Bart. I've just ordered another Intel NIC - shoudn't have used Realtec in the first place!
After I've put the new NIC in i'll re-install OPNsense and go from there.

I'll let you know how it goes 

Henry P..

[henryp]

Hi Bart,
Things were going well after I put the new card in and then it happened again 
I've attached a screenshot but the WAN link just goes down. It works fine if I re-load the WAN interface.
Any help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks.

https://snag.gy/VjhB6P.jpg

Henry P

Hi Henry,

There has traditionally been a dark cloud over Realtek drivers in FreeBSD. Any chance you could swap the interfaces to see if that keeps the WAN side up longer?

As well as trying that, you can pare OPNsense down to its bare minimum; firewall with IPv4 outbound NAT and port forward for the inbound traffic you absolutely need. No Suricata, DNS, Netflow, etc.

Run in this smallest possible footprint and see if that stops the dropouts. If it does, you have a baseline you can compare to when you start adding stuff back in.

Bart...

[bartjsmit]

Hi Henry,

The screenshot shows your firewall still running Suricata and Netflow.

Can you try and run with those disabled for a while? It can be difficult to pin down soft errors like these with too many moving parts.

Bart...

[henryp]

Hi Bart,
After I went "back to basics" it has been working fine!
Where do you think I should go from here?

Thanks
Henry..
https://snag.gy/ClJqVP.jpg

[bartjsmit]

Hi Henry,

Good going!

General troubleshooting dictates that you add bits back one by one until the problem resurfaces. At that point you roll back to before the change that broke it.

Once you know what causes the issue, you can go into the configuration for that part and see if there is a combination of settings that works. If there isn't one, you can do further digging into the root cause.

Or you can conclude that the particular feature is not worth your effort and live with a slightly simpler, but much more stable firewall ;-)

Bart...

[dragon2611]

Try it without Suricata, that's what used to break my opnsense VM in a way which would usually just stop traffic passing.

I've not tried it again on later releases mind to see if that's fixed but I get when running Suricata you have to be rather fussy about which NIC drivers you are using