WAN Speedtest application - why not in pfSense?

[mafflerbach]

I was curious, is there any good way to do a WAN speedtest on these routers? I am surprised there is no application on the Diagnostics menu to perform a speedtest to some remote server.

Is there some reason this is not an option?

-Mike

[doktornotor]

pkg install py27-speedtest-cli
rehash
speedtest-cli

[guardian]

Big thanks to doktornotor - gave it a shot and it works, but I thought I would share my results with the community.

If you have a fast connection (and small hardware for pfSense), this may not be your best choice for testing, but it should be great for DSL or lower end cable connection.

Ran the test from my desktop (which is routed through pfSense) and I got 3 consecutive D/Ls of over 300Mbit/s

My speedtest-cli results were nowhere near as good: (same box used to route traffic - network quiet at time of test)

Download: 203.29 Mbit/s
Upload: 19.85 Mbit/s
–--
Download: 260.64 Mbit/s
Upload: 20.61 Mbit/s

Download: 148.00 Mbit/s
Upload: 19.99 Mbit/s

Download: 196.81 Mbit/s
Upload: 20.44 Mbit/s

FYI the pfSense box is
Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU J1900 @ 1.99GHz
Current: 1411 MHz, Max: 1993 MHz
4 CPUs: 1 package(s) x 4 core(s)
Intel NICs

CPU usage peaked at about 33% during the test.

I don't know if the issue is how the python is coded, the hardware it's running on; or if the javascipt brower app is lying, but in my case about 150 is about as much as I would trust it for.  My connection is 250/20 (with short term bursts to about 350/275 if the network has spare bandwidth).

[johnpoz]

Since this is router/firewall - wouldn't you want to to test "through" it vs from its own interface..

"CPU usage peaked at about 33% during the test."

Does the cpu spike like that when you route/firewall traffic through it??

[guardian]

@johnpoz:

Since this is router/firewall - wouldn't you want to to test "through" it vs from its own interface..

I just ran the test for the heck of it because I saw this thread.  I think the outcome was to test what the ISP, so testing from the WAN would eliminate the rest of the network.

@johnpoz:

"CPU usage peaked at about 33% during the test."

Does the cpu spike like that when you route/firewall traffic through it??

When I run through the firewall from the browser, about the highest I saw was 16-20%, and that's with about 250K IPs in pfBlockerNG.

[Harvy66]

PFSense is optimized to be a firewall and router, not an app server. In my experience, doing a speedtest to PFSense uses about 2x the CPU and I get a 5% reduction in speed than testing through PFSense. Testing through PFSense means that that bandwidth is actually doubled since all incoming packets must also go out. This means doing a speedtest to/from PFSense is about 4x more expensive per packet.

[Smoothrunnings]

@Harvy66:

PFSense is optimized to be a firewall and router, not an app server. In my experience, doing a speedtest to PFSense uses about 2x the CPU and I get a 5% reduction in speed than testing through PFSense. Testing through PFSense means that that bandwidth is actually doubled since all incoming packets must also go out. This means doing a speedtest to/from PFSense is about 4x more expensive per packet.

I don't see there being an issue having an app to do speed tests from pfsense. I know that my unifi USG Pro has an app built in to do speed tests and there are a few other firewall/routers that do the same.