Router does not support configuring DNS settings

[stillhuman]

I am using a Cox panoramic gateway router which does not allow me to manually configure my DNS settings. Is there an alternative method to doing so?

All help is appreciated.

Thank you.

[chrislph]

The router will have two places for DNS settings.

1. The DNS settings that the router uses. These are usually external servers, like the ISP's DNS or Google's DNS.
2. The DNS settings that it tells clients to use when they join your network and do a DHCP request.

Normally the router acts as the DNS server (and forwards requests externally via setting 1) and also acts as DHCP server (and tells clients to use the router for DNS via setting 2).

Which of those cannot be manually configured?

If it's 1 then that's okay. You can edit the settings in 2 and make your router give clients your Pi-hole's IP address as the DNS. Now all your clients will use the Pi-hole, and the router's own DNS isn't being used.

If it's 2 then your clients are all forced to use the router. In that case you can edit setting 1 and make the Pi-hole the "external" DNS that your router uses. This works but it is not as useful because all the requests seem to come from the router and so you cannot tell which client is asking for which domain. And if you have busy clients the router can end up asking too quickly in too short a time and Pi-hole will restrict it (although you can edit the thresholds if needed).

An alternative is to turn off the DHCP in the router and turn on the DHCP in the Pi-hole and used that for DHCP instead. Pi-hole tells clients to use Pi-hole for DNS. The router still has a DNS server running but it's ignored by all your clients. This method works well and has the advantage that Pi-hole easily learns the client's hostnames and shows them in logs.

[rdwebdesign]

There is another alternative you can use as a last resort:

You can manually set the DNS server on each device you want to use Pi-hole.
This way, each device will show up in Pi-hole Dashboard as a separate device.
The annoying part is: you will need to manually set Pi-hole's IP on each device. Also, a few devices won't allow you to manually set DNS settings.