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    PfSense is unreachable after install

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved General pfSense Questions
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    • M
      mathomas3 @rcoleman-netgate
      last edited by

      @rcoleman-netgate said in PfSense is unreachable after install:

      @mathomas3 said in PfSense is unreachable after install:

      I just installed FreeBSD on the box

      FreeBSD 12?

      I am downloading that now... The one that I first used was version 13.2

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        mathomas3 @johnpoz
        last edited by mathomas3

        @johnpoz said in PfSense is unreachable after install:

        @rcoleman-netgate said in PfSense is unreachable after install:

        FreeBSD 12?

        good question... 2.6 is 12.3, while 2.7 is 14... So try installing the the 2.7 snapshot..

        Just seems like a crazy set of circumstances that whatever this nic is in some off brand china box... Never heard of G-PRO COMPUTER which is what comes up for that 00:23:24 mac address. And the nic is being identified as a I217 Intel?

        So whatever driver is being used em, I would think igb would be what would come up for a i217? But I am not really a driver guy.. @stephenw10 is the driver/hardware guy around here - if anyone would know it would be him..

        This machine is a Lenovo ThinkCentre M93P

        And yes that NIC is a intel I217-LM

        Unfortunately I did try the 2.7 Development snapshot yesterday the 20230215 build and with minimal testing, it didnt look hopeful

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        • R
          rcoleman-netgate Netgate @mathomas3
          last edited by

          @mathomas3 said in PfSense is unreachable after install:

          I am downloading that now... The one that I first used was version 13.2

          If 13 didn't work 12 probably won't. As noted by @johnpoz 2.7-DEV (and 23.01-RELEASE) is 14.

          Ryan
          Repeat, after me: MESH IS THE DEVIL! MESH IS THE DEVIL!
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            mathomas3 @rcoleman-netgate
            last edited by

            @rcoleman-netgate

            I just got done with testing...

            FreeBSD
            v13 works... It pulls an IP and can ping the OldBox
            v12 Doesnt work. Failed to pull an IP and after manually setting one it failed to ping OldBox

            Ill try the PfSense Dev build one more time. I didnt give it a fair chance I think

            johnpozJ 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • johnpozJ
              johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @mathomas3
              last edited by

              @mathomas3 if v13 of freebsd works, I would have to believe 2.7 would work since that is v14 of freebsd.. if the 2.7 doesn't work but freebsd 14 works then yeah time to get into the weeds on what could be going on - I would assume 2.7 would be using the same driver that comes with v14..

              But when it comes to getting into the weeds with drivers Steve would be my go to guy that is for sure.

              An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
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                mathomas3 @johnpoz
                last edited by

                @johnpoz I just did a straight forward install of dev. I didnt change any IPs and just assigned the WAN and LAN. and connected this directly to a PC with an IP of 192.168.1.2. Tried to ping and checked the arp table. Nothing... Ill keep on looking into what I can find

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                • johnpozJ
                  johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @mathomas3
                  last edited by

                  @mathomas3 so did you try install freebsd 14 - does that work?

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                    mathomas3 @johnpoz
                    last edited by

                    @johnpoz I just tried that and no it did not. Never pulled dhcp

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                    • johnpozJ
                      johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @mathomas3
                      last edited by

                      @mathomas3 so v13 of freebsd works but v14 does not - so what could of changed in the driver?? And 12 doesn't work either that would explain why 2.6 or 2.7 doesn't work - but yeah this seems to need @stephenw10 expertise.

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                        mathomas3 @johnpoz
                        last edited by

                        @johnpoz I went back and double checked everything on v13 and I couldnt replicate the same result... perhaps in my haste it was pinging itself but then again I check the ARP table and it was there(logs from earlier) so...

                        I did try and research this on other forums and there isnt much out there... but according to this https://bsd-hardware.info/?id=pci:8086-153a-1028-05cc it should so I dont know what to think

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                        • stephenw10S
                          stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                          last edited by

                          Mmm, I'm not aware of anything that behaves anything like this. Let alone something that is recognised as em which should be well understood and supported at this point.

                          The other thing we saw here was that the em NIC does still show the link status correctly even though it does not pull an IP or show any layer 2 connectivity. So that seems unlikely to be some weird unsupported PHY. Or somehow not the correct port.

                          So, some regression in FreeBSD edge? I see nothing listed.

                          I would try disabling hardware checksum off-loading on em0 just in case. Nothing else set there looks likely.

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                          • johnpozJ
                            johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @stephenw10
                            last edited by johnpoz

                            @stephenw10 what doesn't make any sense to me is that if there was a freebsd or pfsense even thing with I217 - wouldn't forums be a fire with complaints? I mean that is not an uncommon off brand nic.. But looking at the freebsd listing for em.. It doesn't specifically list the 217 only the 210 and 211

                            https://man.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=igb&apropos=0&sektion=4&manpath=FreeBSD+14.0-CURRENT&arch=default&format=html

                                 o	 Intel i210 and	i211 Gigabit Ethernet Controller
                                 o	 Intel i350 and	i354 Gigabit Ethernet Controller
                            

                            You have a pretty extensive lab from previous discussions, you don't have a I217 to test with?

                            Here is intel drivers for freebsd, would it be possible to try and load those?

                            https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/download/15187/intel-network-adapter-gigabit-base-driver-for-freebsd.html

                            It specifically calls out the I217-LM is that what is being detected?

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                              mathomas3 @stephenw10
                              last edited by

                              @stephenw10 I tried the following in shell on a fresh install... ifconfig em0 -vlanhwfilter -vlanhwtso and tried to ping the OldBox and didnt get any response

                              If I did go down the road of building a new driver provided by intel... something I have done before but on systems that had network connectivity... how would I proceed? from the console I havent accessed/mounted a USB before

                              This feels like a simple solution should be out there... everything seems right but when it comes time to have an IP... nope -_-

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                                mathomas3
                                last edited by

                                When I have been doing these freebsd 'tests' they have been using the minimal(small) usb image which requires an internet connection to download extra data to finish the install... I have been using this to test the different versions(downloads are slow) so basically I have been booting to usb installer and testing ping and what not...

                                Feels strange that the usb hotspot works well vs an intel NIC... -_-

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                                • stephenw10S
                                  stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                                  last edited by

                                  Try: ifconfig em0 -txcsum -rxcsum

                                  You're not using VLANs at all there from what I can see?

                                  Whilst I have a lot of hardware (too much? 😉 ) I don't have anything that has an i217-lm NIC. Though I agree, if it was broken in general we'd be flooded with threads! So that implies there is something specific about this implementation of it that the FreeBSD driver has an issue with. Which is what made me suspect they might have used some odd PHY there.

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                                    mathomas3 @stephenw10
                                    last edited by

                                    @stephenw10 said in PfSense is unreachable after install:

                                    Try: ifconfig em0 -txcsum -rxcsum

                                    You're not using VLANs at all there from what I can see?

                                    Whilst I have a lot of hardware (too much? 😉 ) I don't have anything that has an i217-lm NIC. Though I agree, if it was broken in general we'd be flooded with threads! So that implies there is something specific about this implementation of it that the FreeBSD driver has an issue with. Which is what made me suspect they might have used some odd PHY there.

                                    I tried the command above without rebooting from the previous command that I mentioned... and still nothing... I tried to ping out and in on the private IP space... I am able to ping out via the internet though(through the usb hotspot... I know not really helping here but I had to have some POSITIVE result to say here)

                                    A bonus of the internet access is that it will make it easier to build a new driver if needed... thoughts?

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                                      mathomas3 @stephenw10
                                      last edited by

                                      @stephenw10 I have read the instructions from intel and they seem pretty straight forward... If I were to follow though with them, I understand that any update to the OS would break things and also some functionality would break the drive via the web interface... beyond this are there concerns should I try this?

                                      I know this would be a workaround vs solving the problem, but my existing system is failing(restarted the OldBox 5x friday, I suspect that the usb hotspot is drawing too much power and overheating the chip on this fanless system) thus having a stable workaround is favorable vs a dying one

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                                      • M
                                        mathomas3 @mathomas3
                                        last edited by

                                        I tried to follow the instructions for the driver install and when I issued the command to 'make' I the error 'unable to locate the kernal source tree"

                                        Thoughts?

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                                          mathomas3
                                          last edited by mathomas3

                                          @stephenw10 As it would seem... This happens to be a card that has defeated you before :(

                                          https://forum.netgate.com/topic/159452/gui-wont-show-nic-card-interfaces/3

                                          and after doing some reading it would seem that building a driver for this OS is ill advised...

                                          Rock>>ME<<Rock

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                                          • johnpozJ
                                            johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @mathomas3
                                            last edited by johnpoz

                                            @mathomas3 said in PfSense is unreachable after install:

                                            command to 'make' I the error 'unable to locate the kernal source tree"

                                            pfsense is not going to have the stuff to compile, you would need to compile the driver on a freebsd install that has the stuff installed for doing such stuff. I did this many years ago for the dhcp client that had a problem with setting the ttl too low.. It took freebsd like 2 years to actually fix the problem.

                                            But once you build the driver, you should move it to your pfsense.

                                            Simpler solution might be to just get a different nic.. Can you not swap out the nic in that system with a different one?

                                            Remember pfsense runs on freebsd as its base layer OS. It doesn't come with all the bells and whistles that can be installed on the actual freebsd, ie the builder tools needed to compile stuff. While it is possible to do cross compiling on another OS.. if you want to try and build the driver from intel and see if that works - I would install a freebsd v14 current, or you could try with the 12.3 version if your goal is running it on 2.6, then move your driver to pfsense.

                                            An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                                            If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                                            Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                                            SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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