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    Trouble with Comcast - DHCP and ?

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved General pfSense Questions
    11 Posts 4 Posters 6.8k Views
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    • T
      tek1979
      last edited by

      Hello-

      I'm running 1.0.1 from the ISO release, with miniupnpd (20070208) and squid (2.6.5_1-p15).  I'm having problems with pfSense not staying connected to Comcast.  It's a DHCP renewal issue, I think.  If I reboot my cable modem or there is as interruption on Comcast's side, pfSense will not automatically renew my IP, it still shows an old address and interface status of 'up'.  I have to manually renew.

      Also, today, Comcast somehow lost my modem in their system, so their captive portal was sending me to the new customer site with info on how to activate my service.  After they fixed this, HTTP requests started working, HTTPS, POP3, and my SIP phone were not working.  A manual renew didn't fix this, I had to reboot the router, then everything started working.  This is probably not a DHCP issue, but I don't know how to troubleshoot this one, especially because I won't be able to recreate it unless Comcast has problems with my account again.

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      • S
        sullrich
        last edited by

        Known issue.  See http://forum.pfsense.org/index.php/topic,2645.0.html

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        • T
          tek1979
          last edited by

          Thanks, I had seen that thread, but the second part of my problem didn't seem familiar to me as a DHCP problem, any thoughts on that?

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          • S
            sullrich
            last edited by

            No idea on that one, sorry.

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            • Y
              yoda715
              last edited by

              @tek1979:

              Also, today, Comcast somehow lost my modem in their system, so their captive portal was sending me to the new customer site with info on how to activate my service.  After they fixed this, HTTP requests started working, HTTPS, POP3, and my SIP phone were not working.  A manual renew didn't fix this, I had to reboot the router, then everything started working.  This is probably not a DHCP issue, but I don't know how to troubleshoot this one, especially because I won't be able to recreate it unless Comcast has problems with my account again.

              This should have nothing to do with pfSense. Your cable modem maintains a public IP that is different than the public IP assigned to your pfSense box. Whenever your cable modem loses its own public IP, it will renegotiate with Comcast. Sometimes that can get mucked up and it will assume a default IP address and make you go through the setup process again. Rebooting the cable modem usually fixes this problem.

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              • T
                tek1979
                last edited by

                sdale, I understand what you're saying, but it was a reboot of pfSense that fixed the problem, not the modem.  This has happened before, I was running Mikrotik router OS at the time, and it didn't have this problem.  Once Comcast corrected the issue on their end, my service came right back up.  I only brought this up because in my mind, this would be a problem for someone who had pfSense installed in a remote location with no backup management network or hardware.

                Here's what I did with pfSense:
                -verify WAN interface is up and has a valid IP address (OK)
                -try a manual renew (no change)
                -ping a known good public IP (that worked, so my IP address is valid)
                -reboot modem (no change)
                -reboot pfSense (everything is OK now)

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                • S
                  sullrich
                  last edited by

                  Upgrade to a recent snapshot to ensure you are on the latest version.

                  http://snapshots.pfsense.com/FreeBSD6/RELENG_1/updates/

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                  • T
                    tek1979
                    last edited by

                    I can only reproduce the problem if Comcast bumps my modem out of their database again, so I doubt I'll have a chance anytime soon to see if that fixed it.  You hav me upgrade to 2/09 snapshot for a uPnP problem the other day.  If this happens again, I'll let you know.

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                    • Y
                      yoda715
                      last edited by

                      @tek1979:

                      sdale, I understand what you're saying, but it was a reboot of pfSense that fixed the problem, not the modem.  This has happened before, I was running Mikrotik router OS at the time, and it didn't have this problem.  Once Comcast corrected the issue on their end, my service came right back up.  I only brought this up because in my mind, this would be a problem for someone who had pfSense installed in a remote location with no backup management network or hardware.

                      Here's what I did with pfSense:
                      -verify WAN interface is up and has a valid IP address (OK)
                      -try a manual renew (no change)
                      -ping a known good public IP (that worked, so my IP address is valid)
                      -reboot modem (no change)
                      -reboot pfSense (everything is OK now)

                      Yea I misunderstood you. Although, I had the same problem and solution for me was rebooting modem. I also had this same problem every now and then with a dlink router. It's comcast fault :).

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                      • H
                        hchady
                        last edited by

                        does pfsense runs any STP protocol ?
                        comcast is not compatible with STP

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                        • S
                          sullrich
                          last edited by

                          @hchady:

                          does pfsense runs any STP protocol ?
                          comcast is not compatible with STP

                          Only on bridges.

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