Netgate Discussion Forum
    • Categories
    • Recent
    • Tags
    • Popular
    • Users
    • Search
    • Register
    • Login

    Just got a Protectli FW4C!

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved Hardware
    43 Posts 3 Posters 11.7k Views
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as topic
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with topic management privileges can see it.
    • stephenw10S
      stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
      last edited by

      Ok, that's outside the tunnel though so it shows whatever the issue is it's probably nothing to do with the IPSec encryption/decryption.

      You still see ~10ms latency between the sites? Consistently?

      T 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • T
        TheWaterbug @stephenw10
        last edited by

        @stephenw10

        Yes, and this is pings to the LAN address of the opposite router, e.g. through the IPSec tunnel:

        ping 192.168.1.1 -t
        
        Pinging 192.168.1.1 with 32 bytes of data:
        Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=63
        Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=63
        Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=63
        Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=63
        Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=63
        Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=63
        Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=63
        Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=63
        Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=63
        Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=63
        Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=63
        
        Ping statistics for 192.168.1.1:
            Packets: Sent = 11, Received = 11, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
        Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
            Minimum = 8ms, Maximum = 8ms, Average = 8ms
        

        and

        ping 192.168.0.1
        PING 192.168.0.1 (192.168.0.1): 56 data bytes
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=0 ttl=63 time=8.856 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=1 ttl=63 time=8.497 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=2 ttl=63 time=8.440 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=3 ttl=63 time=8.968 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=4 ttl=63 time=8.544 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=5 ttl=63 time=8.557 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=6 ttl=63 time=8.851 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=7 ttl=63 time=8.557 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=8 ttl=63 time=8.494 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=9 ttl=63 time=8.644 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=10 ttl=63 time=8.475 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=11 ttl=63 time=8.740 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=12 ttl=63 time=8.438 ms
        64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=13 ttl=63 time=8.943 ms
        ^X^C
        --- 192.168.0.1 ping statistics ---
        14 packets transmitted, 14 packets received, 0.0% packet loss
        round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 8.438/8.643/8.968/0.184 ms
        

        I'm stumped as to what could cause performance to be so different in different directions.

        T 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • stephenw10S
          stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
          last edited by

          Something in the route throttling it probably.

          T 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • T
            TheWaterbug @stephenw10
            last edited by

            @stephenw10 said in Just got a Protectli FW4C!:

            Something in the route throttling it probably.

            I'm going to take this up with AT&T (main office, business fiber), as I don't think Frontier (home office, residential fiber) will care. Someone on another group mentioned the peering agreements between the two ISPs, but I ran this test just now.

            Here's Speedtest from AT&T in my Main Office, with Frontier manually selected as the Speedtest server:

            6b70d24d-dd61-4c8a-8653-7eb498f75ee1-image.png

            and from my Frontier in my home office, with AT&T auto-selected as the "optimal" Speedtest server:

            e4e7b501-5bd4-4e0f-a72c-03d474985e6c-image.png

            M 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • M
              michmoor LAYER 8 Rebel Alliance @TheWaterbug
              last edited by

              @thewaterbug its completely possible there were route issues in the path. failing link, errors, etc.
              When i had similar issues in the past, ive used mtr to seee the path. At times it was noticble that there was a problem othertimes not.Without additional probing at each site its impossible to tell.
              I do use gateway monitoring and set the monitor IP to the remote end of either the tunnel address or the physical interface address. Might find something interesting.

              Firewall: NetGate,Palo Alto-VM,Juniper SRX
              Routing: Juniper, Arista, Cisco
              Switching: Juniper, Arista, Cisco
              Wireless: Unifi, Aruba IAP
              JNCIP,CCNP Enterprise

              T 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • T
                TheWaterbug @michmoor
                last edited by TheWaterbug

                @michmoor said in Just got a Protectli FW4C!:

                @thewaterbug its completely possible there were route issues in the path. failing link, errors, etc.
                When i had similar issues in the past, ive used mtr to seee the path.

                Here's WinMTR from the main office back to my home office:

                |------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
                |                                      WinMTR statistics                                   |
                |                       Host              -   %  | Sent | Recv | Best | Avrg | Wrst | Last |
                |------------------------------------------------|------|------|------|------|------|------|
                |                             192.168.0.1 -    0 |   85 |   85 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |ispgtway.lightspeed.irvnca.sbcglobal.net -    0 |   85 |   85 |    0 |    0 |    1 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   18 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                          64.148.105.208 -    0 |   85 |   85 |    2 |    2 |    3 |    2 |
                |                            12.242.115.3 -    0 |   85 |   85 |    4 |    6 |   10 |    5 |
                |   be3013.ccr41.lax05.atlas.cogentco.com -    0 |   85 |   85 |    4 |    5 |   25 |    4 |
                |   be3059.ccr42.lax01.atlas.cogentco.com -    0 |   85 |   85 |    4 |    4 |    6 |    5 |
                |be219.rcr21.b40.lax01.atlas.cogentco.com -    0 |   85 |   85 |    5 |    5 |    7 |    5 |
                |                            38.88.245.26 -    0 |   85 |   85 |    4 |    7 |   33 |    8 |
                |   ae1---0.cbr06.lsan.ca.frontiernet.net -    3 |   77 |   75 |    5 |    5 |    6 |    5 |
                |  be10---0.lcr22.lsan.ca.frontiernet.net -    0 |   84 |   84 |    7 |   11 |   15 |   13 |
                |xe-8-1-2-0.fdr01.rlhl.ca.frontiernet.net -    0 |   84 |   84 |    8 |   11 |   59 |   12 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |                      Request timed out. -  100 |   17 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
                |________________________________________________|______|______|______|______|______|______|
                   WinMTR v1.00 GPLv2 (original by Appnor MSP - Fully Managed Hosting & Cloud Provider)
                

                and MTR from my home office back to the main:

                Keys:  Help   Display mode   Restart statistics   Order of fields   quit
                                                                                                           Packets               Pings
                 Host                                                                                    Loss%   Snt   Last   Avg  Best  Wrst StDev
                 1. home.routers.host.name                                                                0.0%    97    1.1   1.9   1.0  10.5   1.9
                 2. home.isp.default.gateway                                                              0.0%    97    8.2   4.8   1.4  40.6   5.6
                 3. te1-7-0-4---0.lcr01.lsan.ca.frontiernet.net                                           0.0%    97    6.7   6.0   2.5  25.4   3.5
                 4. ae8---0.scr01.lsan.ca.frontiernet.net                                                50.5%    97    3.2   4.6   2.7  29.4   4.2
                 5. ae0---0.cbr05.lsan.ca.frontiernet.net                                                 1.0%    97   29.3   9.1   3.5  34.7   6.9
                 6. lag-101.ear2.losangeles1.level3.net                                                  96.9%    97    9.6  13.0   2.7  26.7  12.3
                 7. ae1.3510.edge1.tustin1.level3.net                                                     0.0%    97   12.2  10.2   4.8  90.2  10.2
                 8. 192.205.37.145                                                                        0.0%    97   12.3  12.1   7.0  51.9   5.5
                 9. cr1.la2ca.ip.att.net                                                                  1.0%    97   12.5  13.6   7.4  36.9   4.9
                10. gar5.lsrca.ip.att.net                                                                 0.0%    96    9.4  10.7   6.9  36.6   4.4
                11. (waiting for reply)
                12. 75.20.1.78                                                                            1.0%    96   32.2   8.4   5.9  32.3   4.8
                13. 75.20.0.115                                                                          95.8%    96    6.8   6.9   6.8   7.2   0.2
                14. 64.148.105.209                                                                        0.0%    96    7.7  10.3   7.6  37.3   5.5
                
                
                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • T
                  TheWaterbug
                  last edited by

                  Is there anyone on this thread in the greater LA area that could run iperf and iperf -R to my server? I can port-forward through my firewall. Please PM me if you can. Thanks!

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • T
                    TheWaterbug @TheWaterbug
                    last edited by TheWaterbug

                    @thewaterbug said in Just got a Protectli FW4C!:

                    @stephenw10

                    I'm stumped as to what could cause performance to be so different in different directions.

                    It looks like this was a unit failure. The FW4C unit in my Home Office was shutting off from time to time, and with increasing frequency. I opened a ticket with Protectli, and they advance-shipped me a new one, no questioned asked, without even requiring a credit card. The replacement unit is now in place at my Home Office, with the same configuration, and here's the result of 5 hours in each direction, sequentially, and this time it's through the tunnel, and not through a port-forward:

                    ./iperf3 -w 4M -c 192.168.0.56 -t18001s | tee iperfout.txt && sleep 60 && ./iperf3 -w 4M -c 192.168.0.56 -t18001s -R | tee iperfin.txt
                    

                    5e6a7b5a-b870-4515-a649-76c1bb0ce679-image.png

                    Home-to-Main (Out) averaged 524 Mbps with peaks as high as 639 Mbps, and Main-to-Home (In) averaged 544 Mbps with peaks as high as 661 Mbps. Moreover, the speeds now have a much tighter distribution, and look much more like "the Internet," with the inbound nearing some sort of limit at the mid-600s.

                    So this is all great news. When I started this I had reasonable expectations, and told myself I'd be happy with sustained throughput of 500 Mbps, and I'm getting that. Tonight I may repeat this through a port-forward, just to see how much the tunnel impacts throughput.

                    I am a bit puzzled, though, because when I put the two units side by side on my bench, with just a cable linking the WAN ports at 2.5GBaseT and no Internet, I was able to get 620 Mbps through the tunnel (I didn't think to test through a port-forward at that time). I'm having a hard time figuring out how a misbehaving unit would test reasonably well on the bench but then fail only when the internet enters the picture.

                    Once I have some demonstrated uptime (so I can close my ticket with Protectli for the failing unit), I may swap my SG-1100 back into place and bring the new Home Office FW4C back into the office, right next to the Main Office unit, and test WAN-to-WAN throughput again over a simple cable, both through the tunnel and through a port forward.

                    It's been only 36 hours on the replaced unit, but I'm now really happy with my purchases, and with Protectli support. I'm going to lob a question into their engineer about how he got 980 Mbps on his bench.

                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • stephenw10S
                      stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                      last edited by

                      Different hardware/firmware revision on the NICs maybe?

                      T 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • T
                        TheWaterbug @stephenw10
                        last edited by

                        @stephenw10

                        I don't think so, because it's a brand new product.

                        There was definitely something wrong with the unit that I swapped out, because it was spontaneously shutting itself down.

                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • T
                          TheWaterbug
                          last edited by

                          Here's the port-forward test:

                          b76962a6-20c9-4010-acde-a6143826f1ca-image.png

                          Outbound averaged 586 with a max of 812. Inbound averaged 530 with a max of 825.

                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • T TheWaterbug referenced this topic on
                          • T TheWaterbug referenced this topic on
                          • First post
                            Last post
                          Copyright 2025 Rubicon Communications LLC (Netgate). All rights reserved.