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

    My pc isn't DNS resolving but my pfSense box is

    General pfSense Questions
    6
    25
    2.0k
    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.
    • N
      Neoveo @Gertjan
      last edited by

      @Gertjan MAGIC!!! Many thanks for your wonderful help @Gertjan, I really appreciate it!

      I used cloudfare 1.1.1.1 for IPv4 and 2606:4700:4700::1111 for IPv6 (thank you Google for that).
      Now my Gateway shows IPv4 online and IPv6 as "pending" and "unknown".

      That's better than what I had before!

      Now my question is, since I had working internet, was able to ping and otherwise surf the net all while my gateway was showing offline with 100% packet loss, what purpose does the gateway serve?

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

        The gateway itself is what pfSense routes all your external traffic to at your ISP.

        By default pfSense sends pings to it to check the status but the ISP is under no obligation to respond to ping. Setting the monitoring pings to something external gives better data anyway.

        Besides logging the latency and packet loss pfSense uses the gateway status if you have more than one gateway in a failover or load-balancing.

        Steve

        N 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • N
          Neoveo @stephenw10
          last edited by

          @stephenw10 gotcha, thank you so much for the education, I so much appreciate it.

          My IPv6 still shows as pending and unknown.

          Is this something that will resolve on it's own or do I have some more troubleshooting to do?

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

            Unlikely it would just start working, unless it's something broken at your ISP that they then fix.

            Does your ISP support IPv6?

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • GertjanG
              Gertjan @Neoveo
              last edited by

              @Neoveo said in My pc isn't DNS resolving but my pfSense box is:

              while my gateway was showing offline with 100% packet loss

              Get back to System >Routing > Gateways and edit the WAN_DHCP, just to look.
              At the bottom of the page, click also on "Advanced settings".
              The gateway monitoring is used for two things : in measures the round trip of a constant ping so nice graphs can be produced.
              Also : the action part : it will cycle the interface : taking it down for a short period to rebuild the connection. This in the hope that it will be better (== more stable ping.
              Knowing that the WAN interface(s) are use by other processes like unbound, the resolver, they will also restart at that moment. This could very well explain what you've been experiencing all along.

              IPv6 : First : make things visible. Go to System > Advanced > Networking and check

              Start DHCP6 client in debug mode.

              From now on, the DHCP6 client (close friend, but not related the DHCP servers on your LAN will log more details.
              The logs : Status > System Logs > DHCP

              a93c49c5-5c31-4b83-b0e2-d361897c5044-image.png

              Look for "dhcp6c", that's the one.
              During initial WAN (IPv6) construction, there will be more lines.

              Keep in mind :these days, after severals decades of experimenting, most of the time, you set your WAN IPv4 to 'DHCP' and you'll be good.
              For IPv6 it isn't that easy. DHCPv6 is sued, but most probably more settings have to be selected, as every ISP can offer you IPv6 with it's own sauce. It will probably standardize in a decade or two ;)

              This is the idea :
              Your WANv6 interface gets an IPv6, might be a GUA and/or the other thing, starting with a fe80......, the link local.
              You will also have a IPV6 DNS, IPv6 gateway and a IPv6 subnet mask.

              f5dd3255-3d27-466d-b2de-3134a1df36ba-image.png

              But there is more, we'll get to that.

              No "help me" PM's please. Use the forum, the community will thank you.
              Edit : and where are the logs ??

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • N
                Neoveo
                last edited by

                Okay, I've set up the monitor as you have suggested and here is a screen shot of the logs (for all of the dhcp6c entries it simply says "sending solicit"

                b075a053-0dd4-4836-b8c6-aa409d86c705-DHCP logs.jpg file:///home/neo/Pictures/DHCP logs.jpg

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

                  Seems like your ISP doesn't support IPv6 then. Or at least isn't responding to DHCPv6.

                  Unless they have some special requirement. What does the ISP docs show?

                  N 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • N
                    Neoveo @stephenw10
                    last edited by

                    @stephenw10 said in My pc isn't DNS resolving but my pfSense box is:

                    Seems like your ISP doesn't support IPv6 then. Or at least isn't responding to DHCPv6.

                    Unless they have some special requirement. What does the ISP docs show?

                    I have sent my ISP a message asking them if they support IPv6, I think they do but we'll see what their answer is.

                    N 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                    • N
                      Neoveo @Neoveo
                      last edited by

                      @Neoveo it turns out that my ISP does not currently support IPv6.

                      GertjanG 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • GertjanG
                        Gertjan @Neoveo
                        last edited by

                        @Neoveo

                        That's strange.
                        But make live simpler, for now.
                        The perfect settings :

                        23e222d5-f626-4937-b2aa-7ddae7ce37c5-image.png

                        Under System > Routing > Gateways delete the IPv6 gateway, and select :

                        9ab23979-971e-4eea-ad69-cc70c9c24d3e-image.png

                        Save, Apply and done.

                        You could use an alternative : Configuring IPv6 Through A Tunnel Broker Service, I've been using their IPv6 services ( free ! ) for years. Their IPv6 is, IMHO, even today far better as what most ISP offer.

                        No "help me" PM's please. Use the forum, the community will thank you.
                        Edit : and where are the logs ??

                        N 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                        • N
                          Neoveo @Gertjan
                          last edited by

                          @Gertjan So what is the downside if I didn't set the Default gateway IPv6 to none?

                          I change it to none a few minutes ago but DHCP6 Gateway is still showing up as Pending and Unknown.

                          stephenw10S johnpozJ 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • stephenw10S
                            stephenw10 Netgate Administrator @Neoveo
                            last edited by

                            @Neoveo said in My pc isn't DNS resolving but my pfSense box is:

                            what is the downside if I didn't set the Default gateway IPv6 to none?

                            You have the DHCPv6 process running continually trying to get an IPv6 address on the WAN. You likely won't notice but at the very least it spams the logs with pointless errors hiding potentially useful info.

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

                              @Neoveo said in My pc isn't DNS resolving but my pfSense box is:

                              DHCP6 Gateway is still showing up as Pending and Unknown.

                              Delete the now pointless gateway.

                              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 2.7.2, 24.11

                              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                              • First post
                                Last post
                              Copyright 2025 Rubicon Communications LLC (Netgate). All rights reserved.