Intermittent lack of internet (Google?) on some devices

velkrosmaak

I'm using a fairly vanilla PFSense setup, using DHCP, DNS resolver and Squid. This setup has been running without (major) config changes for at least 4 years.

Since last week, some of my clients (android phones, windows laptops, and google homes) don't appear to have any internet access. On a laptop or phone, it becomes apparent that I can't access Google services. For example, I can't browse to google.com, but I can browse to duckduckgo.com. All the Google Home devices say they can't access the internet but that's presumably because they only rely on Google services.

I've rebooted pfsense as well as all the AP's connected to it, and the clients connected to those. After a reboot of PFSense, I can browse Google again with no issue. Then after a random interval (minutes, hours, up to a day) it will stop again. DNS and DHCP are up and running fine in pfsense during that time.

I would be really grateful for any help troubleshooting this. I'm out of ideas now, and my next step is to reinstall PFsense and start fresh, which I want to avoid. I understand you'll probably need to see some logs or config to help me diagnose so I will post what you need on request.

Thanks in advance for any help!

stephenw10

If those are all running though Squid, check this:
https://docs.netgate.com/pfsense/en/latest/cache-proxy/squid-troubleshooting.html#sites-not-loading-with-splice-error-409-in-access-log

Steve

velkrosmaak

Thanks for the response!

I did try clearing the squid cache through the UI, but just ran these commands as per the linked docs.

mv /var/squid/cache /var/squid/cache.old
squid -z
rm -rf /var/squid/cache.old

I'll keep you posted!

Incidentally, I did some browser based packet loss tests which at worst had 56% of packets dropped. Could this have been squid too? Fingers crossed!

velkrosmaak

Followed the full reset instructions on the linked page, reinstalled squid - back in business.

Thanks for the help @stephenw10!