Hyper-V - PFsense 2.0.1 - Some tips.

heuristik

Issue 1: The AMD proc-specific boot fail. If you can't even get Pfsense to load in your VM beyond the initial "post," you know what I'm referring to here. You'll see
something like the following:
Stopped at pmap_invalidate_cache_range+0x40 clflushl 0(%ebx)
db>
Workaround: At initial menu, choose option 7 to escape to the command line. Type the following at the OK prompt:
Set hw.clflush_disable=1
boot
Installation will continue as normal. After reboot, you need to escape again to the command line, re-enter the same command and boot into PFSense.

Now you can make the fix permanent. Once PFsense is at the main menu, shell out to a command prompt. Type the following:
vi /boot/loader.conf
arrow down to the last line, press "a" to append (make sure cursor is on a new line after last entry in file). on new line type:
hw.clflush_disable=1
press return, then escape, then the keys "wq!" to write the changes to the file.
Verify your changes by typing "more /boot/loader.conf" and look for your entry at the end.

Issue 2: No NICs found. You have to use Legacy NICs, the default nics are not recognized by Free BSD.

Issue 3: PFSense doesn't receive a DHCP address.
So you get all the way through the install, you can hit PF's Web configurator just fine, but it won't pick up dhcp from your WAN provider, huh?
Yeah, this one had me stumped for a bit. Thanks to some great posts in this forum, I was able to find a quick resolution, so I'm just
summarizing here and hopefully providing a consolidated reference for those seeking help in the future.
For whatever reason, DEx nics don't immediately listen for dhcp assignments in Hyper-V. If you down the adapter, bring it back up, then listen,
it works just fine. Shell out to the command prompt and type the following:
ifconfig de(x) down [where (x) corresponds to the nic you are troubleshooting for dhcp]
ifconfig de(x) up
dhclient de(x)
now make the change permanent. create an /etc/rc.local file (vi /etc/rc.local), add those commands, save the file, then type
chmod 755 /etc/rc.local
to make it an executable for root.

ChrisH1

Issue 4: CARP won't work due to a bug in the "de" network driver. See http://forum.pfsense.org/index.php/topic,44529.0.html
No workaround known yet.

heuristik

thanks for the heads up on that, Chris. I just started trying to get that working between vms on a couple of HV hosts…

I think I read recently that Microsoft just updated its linux integration services disk a couple of weeks ago. Anyone look to see if there's some love for freebsd yet?

behzad

Hi,
Thanks for the tips.
I'm trying to install pfSense 2.0.1 on Microsoft hyper-v with 2 legacy adapters.
system halts at startup and the first tip has no effect on it!
What can I do now?
Thanks.

error.png_thumb

cicero44bc

Thanks for the tips heuristik & ChrisH1. I noticed that for some reason DHCP wasn't dishing out IPs on the LAN interface either. I fixed this in a similar method with ifconfig de1 down and ifconfig de1 up, where de1 is the LAN. I added this to /etc/rc.local and its been fine ever since.

behzad I had some similar issues when using dynamically expanding disks. When I created a fixed disk on IDE it was fine after that.

jceb3167

I don't think that Pfsense is ready to work well on HyperV since this hypervisor does not support FreeBSD 8.1.
It may work but I doubt it will be suitable for production equipment.
I would recommend to use ESXi instead.

http://www.opttic.com

cicero44bc

I agree, for a test environment though its been fine for me. I have not used it beyond basic routing however.

janneb

I have successfully used your tips to install pfsense on hyper-v 2.0 (Win8 / Srv2012) today and will use it as my primary home firewall. Very convenient to run my firewall on my workstation (Hyper-V is built in win8). I will let you know what I find out. One obvious limitation is that the legacy adapters are 100mbit :'(

janneb

SOpenness 6 Aug 2012 9:46 AM
Thank you for your interest in the FreeBSD support for Hyper-V! Check back on the blog later this week, when we’ll have more details on the release and where to get the code

http://blogs.technet.com/b/openness/archive/2012/05/10/freebsd-support-on-windows-server-hyper-v.aspx

C'mon c'mon c'mon ..

cicero44bc

Thanks Janneb. Fortunately the drivers are already released (I foolishly hadn't thought to check until you posted this!) http://blogs.technet.com/b/openness/archive/2012/08/09/available-today-freebsd-support-for-windows-server-hyper-v.aspx which links to building the kernel with the new drivers here - https://github.com/FreeBSDonHyper-V/freebsd/wiki/Build-the-kernel-with-the-HyperV-drivers I'm yet to try it but it sounds exciting.

ericsche

Hello,

drivers are for FreeBSD 8.2 and beyond so we need to use PFSense 2.1

I've been trying for a few days with no luck :(
Any idea how to patch the kernel ?

jimp

Even if you manage to get it to work, they still have a lot of work to do before it would be useful on a firewall.

See http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-stable/2012-August/069148.html

cicero44bc

Thanks for the heads up jimp.

iskull

I'm trying to use pfSense w/ Hyper-v on Windows 2008 R2, but I'm not getting :-\

My pfsense version:

[2.0.1-RELEASE][admin@maybach.prosperi.local]/root(30): uname -a
FreeBSD maybach.prosperi.local 8.1-RELEASE-p6 FreeBSD 8.1-RELEASE-p6 #0: Mon Dec 12 18:15:35 EST 2011     root@FreeBSD_8.0_pfSense_2.0-AMD64.snaps.pfsense.org:/usr/obj./usr/pfSensesrc/src/sys/pfSense_SMP.8  amd64

I'm getting this messagens in dmesg:

calcru: runtime went backwards from 5 usec to 2 usec for pid 17 (vmdaemon)
calcru: runtime went backwards from 166 usec to 92 usec for pid 16 (pagedaemon)
calcru: runtime went backwards from 435 usec to 247 usec for pid 9 (pfpurge)
calcru: runtime went backwards from 36 usec to 19 usec for pid 8 (sctp_iterator)
calcru: runtime went backwards from 7720 usec to 4033 usec for pid 7 (fdc0)
calcru: runtime went backwards from 8496 usec to 4631 usec for pid 14 (yarrow)
calcru: runtime went backwards from 1121396 usec to 603195 usec for pid 4 (g_down)
calcru: runtime went backwards from 818454 usec to 429006 usec for pid 3 (g_up)

And searching on the web I found this:

http://xtravirt.com/disabling-virtual-machine-guest-host-time-synchronization-multiple-hypervisors
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/troubleshoot.html#calcru-negative-runtime
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/troubleshoot.html#COMPUTER-CLOCK-SKEW

I tried all solutions above, but no success yet :( any suggestions?

tester_02

@iskull:

I tried all solutions above, but no success yet :( any suggestions?

Move on for now. I've moved on to vmware until hyper-v on freebsd gets sorted out. I'd love to come back and run hyper-v as I would not have to install other software on the windows machines I am running it on.
Oracle solution seems good too.

iskull

@tester_02:

@iskull:

I tried all solutions above, but no success yet :( any suggestions?

Move on for now. I've moved on to vmware until hyper-v on freebsd gets sorted out. I'd love to come back and run hyper-v as I would not have to install other software on the windows machines I am running it on.
Oracle solution seems good too.

:(

If somebody runs pfsense with successful on Hyper-V - Windows 2008 r2, please, share with us :D

kobedexter

Hi I'm new in PFsense, but i found this blog in google

http://www.zomers.eu/knowledge/pfSense/Pages/Install-pfSense-on-Windows-2008-Hyper-V-server.aspx

with this guide I have instaled the PFsense in the hyper-v, but I have a Problem, when y restart PFsense these loss conection to internet.

msi

Just as JimP said: The support for FreeBSD inside Hyper-V is still far from complete.

My general (and painful experience) with Linux was: It took MS ages to support it correctly, now it's ok.
Everything that MS does not support with integration drivers is slow or even crashy, I wouldn't even remotely consider pfSense for any production use on Hyper-V yet. Sorry to say :-/

tester_02

Anyone try pfsense under 2012 hyper-v? I am just starting to test 2012, so I plan to give it a shot.

peterclark4

They seem to run pretty much the same, I have migrated a few from 2008 to 2012.