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    WAN DHCP Problem

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved General pfSense Questions
    30 Posts 6 Posters 9.9k Views
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    • J
      jp141
      last edited by

      Right hopefully a bit of success!

      I got it in to a position where it was stuck in the loop of doom

      Then I changed the interface from auto select to 1000 Base T full duplex

      That brought it out of its loop of death and is working without a reboot!

      So fingers crossed this is now fixed! :D

      I think there is a problem with it trying to negotiate speed/duplex and get an IP at the same time, possibly only a problem with certain cable modems?

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      • stephenw10S
        stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
        last edited by

        Hmm, seems odd.
        When you change the connection type like that the interface is brought down and back up so that may have triggered the reconnect.
        Good luck!

        Steve

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        • J
          jp141
          last edited by

          yeah that's true, but the connection was going up and down like a yoyo before unless it is a full reset of the connection as opposed to just the link state?

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          • stephenw10S
            stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
            last edited by

            The link state is reported by the driver to the OS in order to trigger the DHCP client etc. Bringing the interface up and down is more than that. You can test it easily enough if it starts flapping again:

            
            ifconfig sk1 down
            ifconfig sk1 up
            
            

            Steve

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            • J
              jp141
              last edited by

              Ok thanks I will keep an eye on it and keep you posted.

              I really hope this is fixed, I love pfSense but it is driving me absolutely balmy almost to the point I want to scrap this FW and get something else :(

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              • J
                jp141
                last edited by

                Well that does indeed seemed to have fixed it! fingers crossed :)

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                • Y
                  yaw
                  last edited by

                  I have this EXACT same issue. It only affects DHCP on the WAN. My static interfaces are not affected. Only a reboot will correct it.

                  I too found the manual duplex work around, and that does seem to work. However, here is the problem..

                  So, you force pfsense to a manual duplex setting. You better hope you can do the same on the cable modem, or you WILL have a duplex mismatch. In my case, I cannot manually set the duplex on my cable modem. Since the cable modem only supports auto negotiation on its interface, the instant you manually set your duplex in pfsense the cable modem's NIC will default to half duplex. So, you have 100 full duplex set in pfsense, and the cable modem will be running at 100 half duplex. This is by design.

                  I'm left with two options here.. a duplex mismatch or force everything to 100 half duplex. This isn't a great work around.

                  Now, what I said works a little different with gig links (I'm limited to 10/100), but the bottom line is that you should always set auto or manual duplex on both ends. You should never set auto on one end, and manual on the other.

                  I'd love to know what is causing this so I don't have to fool with manually adjusting my duplex settings.

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                  • Y
                    yaw
                    last edited by

                    @stephenw10:

                    The link state is reported by the driver to the OS in order to trigger the DHCP client etc. Bringing the interface up and down is more than that. You can test it easily enough if it starts flapping again:

                    
                    ifconfig sk1 down
                    ifconfig sk1 up
                    
                    

                    Steve

                    I tried this the last time the problem occurred, and it made no difference. I'd down the interface, but something kept automatically bringing it back up - and the link state kept flapping.

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                    • C
                      cmb
                      last edited by

                      It's a NIC driver issue that's outside of our control, may want to try a 2.1 snapshot since it has a newer base OS where that may not be an issue. See the 2.1 board heree.

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                      • Y
                        yaw
                        last edited by

                        Thanks for the info. I've been searching for problems related to the VR4 driver which supports the VT6105M NIC on 8.1, but I'm coming up empty. Can you share where you found that? I'm curious as to the exact issue, and in what release it's fixed.

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                        • W
                          wallabybob
                          last edited by

                          An earlier post reported this problem on sk interfaces. Are you seeing a similar problem on vr interfaces?

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                          • G
                            GoldServe
                            last edited by

                            I have the same issue with my Cable Modem and em interface when I do mac address cloning. Interface flaps up and down sometimes. I don't know what triggers it. Now that I have selected 100BT Half Duplex, it seems to be working good. I don't think it is as simple as driver issues in FreeBSD.

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                            • stephenw10S
                              stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                              last edited by

                              Did you ever try JimP's suggestion, here?

                              Steve

                              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                              • Y
                                yaw
                                last edited by

                                @wallabybob:

                                An earlier post reported this problem on sk interfaces. Are you seeing a similar problem on vr interfaces?

                                Can you reference the post, and I'll take a look?

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                                • G
                                  GoldServe
                                  last edited by

                                  @stephenw10:

                                  Did you ever try JimP's suggestion, here?

                                  Steve

                                  Yes, I did make those changes to my inc files but no help. Still some up and down flapping loop.

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                                  • W
                                    wallabybob
                                    last edited by

                                    @yaw:

                                    @wallabybob:

                                    An earlier post reported this problem on sk interfaces. Are you seeing a similar problem on vr interfaces?

                                    Can you reference the post, and I'll take a look?

                                    See replies 3, 9 and 11 of this topic. I'm curious if this is a problem of a particular class of NIC or a more generic DHCP problem.

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                                    • C
                                      cmb
                                      last edited by

                                      @GoldServe:

                                      I have the same issue with my Cable Modem and em interface when I do mac address cloning. Interface flaps up and down sometimes.

                                      Pre-2.0.1 would flap repeatedly when MAC spoofing in some circumstances, upgrade to 2.0.1 to fix that.

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                                      • Y
                                        yaw
                                        last edited by

                                        @wallabybob:

                                        @yaw:

                                        @wallabybob:

                                        An earlier post reported this problem on sk interfaces. Are you seeing a similar problem on vr interfaces?

                                        Can you reference the post, and I'll take a look?

                                        See replies 3, 9 and 11 of this topic. I'm curious if this is a problem of a particular class of NIC or a more generic DHCP problem.

                                        Sorry.. I thought you were talking about another thread. Yes, this is the same issue except with the vr interfaces. It only happens with DHCP, and I can replicate it every time.

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