Does anyone know how to get DHCP to pass DNS to the connect client of a Linksys SPNX55-GC?
I tryed before and it just showed the router in pi-hole and all queries from that
This is kind of urgent as nothing is using pi-hole
If that's a Gigaclear-provided ISP router.. they lock the firmware down on their routers and you can't configure the DHCP options.
Source: I've looked at my parents Gigaclear router before.
Can you switch off the DHCP on the router? If so, you can enable Pi-hole's built in DHCP to replace it.
Or get a third party router
https://www.reddit.com/r/gigaclear/comments/1523c9n/settings_for_third_party_routers/
I have some options but setting the DNS like I said, its client to router to pi-hole
well, I can but then, I don't know, the node kept disconnecting like I said in my other thread
I am trying to narrow down the issue but not using the pi-hole DHCP
I thought maybe pi-hole is not assigning the address fast enough
I think Gigaclear have the serial number, I think they use like the pi-hole DHCP system ignore unknown clients for there WAN address
I plugged a PC directly into the fibre box before and it got no connection
our Main router/node is set to DHCP
If the node mesh work like it should there would be no issue
a signal node worked perfectly, we got a child node, it disconnects every few days
ISP provided routers are almost always locked down to prevent you from doing anything "fun" with them, but I guess they bank on the average user not needing to do anything like that.
Like I said - your options are Pi-hole DHCP or getting a third party router. Doesn't look like anything can be done about it not handing out the "correct" DNS server to clients
I will see what happens, I might go back to using pi-hole DHCP, it can't have been the problem
do you know of any issues when using pi-hole DHCP for a child node
No idea I'm afraid - I've never used a mesh setup like this before. Good luck!
Thank you anyway
I will see what happens as I had to factory reset the nodes today
Hi, I have a linksys router on Gigaclear and it can be made to do what you want - assuming I correctly understand what you want to do!
If you want to use the DHCP from the router then you can just set the "static DNS 1" in the picture you posted above to point to your Pi-Hole. I have done this and it works. The router itself will use your Pi-Hole DNS and it will serve the same to all cilents over DHCP.
Of course the better option is to run DHCP on the Pi-Hole instead. In this case, do the same as above (set the "static DNS 1" value to point to your Pi-Hole) and then untick "Enabled" (very top of your picture) to disable the router's DHCP. You will find that the rest of the values on that screen will grey-out (including "static DNS 1"). However, in my experience, the router will still use the settings. So, the router itself will use the Pi-Hole for its own DNS and because you are running DHCP from your Pi-Hole and THAT is pointing to the Pi-Hole DNS, so will all your clients
On a general note, although Linksys do try and make your life as difficult as possible, it CAN be made to do what you want. Some basic tips;-
- Do not use the mobile app - it is not needed (ever!) despite what Linksys try and make you believe, and all you are doing with it is giving Linksys a back door into your router and configuring it to spy on you and send goodness-knows what to Linksys. If you have already used the app and crossed that red line then I'm not sure what you can do to revoke it (because I've never used it). I'm guessing you can delete your "account" with Linksys and tell them to delete all your information. It would also seem sensible to change the password on the router though I have no idea if that would then block Linksys or whether they could use some other mechanism.
- Use the router's web interface instead. To make this more useful, once you log into the web interface, click the (deliberately very very small and obscure) "CA" link in the very bottom-right of the page. This will enable a bunch of options that are disabled by default (deliberately disabled by Linksys so that you give up and use their app!). Once you do this, the web interface can do anything the app can do (except spy on you).
- Once you have Pi-Hole up and running and are pointing your router to use Pi-Hole as its DNS (as I described in the previous post) then make a client entry for the router in Pi-Hole and add this client to a profile that blocks belkin.com, cloud1.linksyssmartwifi.com, linksys.com and in-addr.arpa (all with wilcards) - this will stop it spying on you though you will have to revoke the linksys.com block if you want to check for updates. Also note that with these blocks in place, the status page will often say that you have no connection to the internet because the mechanism it uses to test this will no longer work. The light on the top of the unit seems to still work ok though (colour still correctly reflects the status of the system) and it will still work perfectly well.
You also mention that your satellite router drops the link sometimes. I also use a satellite router and I have never experienced this. Mine is connected over ethernet though. If yours has a wifi-only connection then I strongly recommend you look into making it a wired (ethernet) link - it will be much more reliable and it will be much faster too.
If it is already a wire link and it's dropping out then I would look at your wiring because I have never had an issue and I have about 60m of ethernet between my two routers. If the link is very long then then I would use cat6A rather than cat5 - it will give better noise immunity.
I decided to enable pi-hole DHCP from client devices
And set the DHCP to 1 device on the Linksys node with a reservation for the child node IP
DHCP parent node provides child node IP
DHCP Pi-hole provides every other IP
Will there be any issues running 2 DHCP server on the same network
I can do wired backhaul or whatever it’s called but it’s not convenient and would require taking carpets up and making holes in walls
Yea... I probably wouldn't do that. I see where you're coming from but I don't think that's a good idea. It's been a while - I can't quite remember how the separate nodes present themselves on the network now
This can be done. If you limit each DHCP Server to certain ranges. See comments from @Bucking_Horn on this subject.
As a general advice, you could run two DHCP servers on the same link, as long as their IP address pools for dynamically allocated IPs do not overlap, and you should make sure that your static IP address allocations (aka DHCP lease reservations) would be identical and outside of both your DHCP server's IP address pool ranges.
You should also note that only the DHCP server handing out the current DHCP lease would be aware of a client's hostname as presented by the client during DHCP lease negotiation.
One more thing that I have just discovered
On the router, if you go to Connectivity -> Internet Settings -> IPv6 there is an option called "IPv6 - Automatic". This was enabled for me and it was causing an IPv6 DNS address to be passed on to clients. This was causing clienys to request DNS via the router rather than directly from the Pi-Hole. I disabled this and the problem went away.
The last I heard, Gigaclear do not support IPv6. So I wonder if they have just enabled it (or some part of it)?
I did notice when I did this before
The smart TV got DHCP NAK from the parent node but never retried pi-hole
Pi-hole sent ACK but the TV never received it
Pi-hole is set ignore unknown
And the node is set to only give 1 address
Yeah, that’s strange, I noticed that
The parent node is always looking for an IPv6 WAN, always says connecting, I don’t think any of my devices have got an address though
I have just got to see what happens over the next few days now
My nodes didn’t like me changing the SSID on the 2.4GHz, they have to be the same SSID
Anyway thank you everyone for all this information
Sorry moderators, I would say it’s more Linksys than pi-hole