Home Network Setup
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Xpost for @krisleslie
Hi guys just getting the need to change stuff on my day off
At my home I have Spectrum internet, Spectrum supplies the router, a Ubiquiti access point, and a couple of XenServer host for home lab and a HP switch.
I’m gonna gonna move the dns and dhcp off the router to a vm. What Linux distro to use? I’ve seen Sophos XG looks good as well as Untangle.
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For DNS and DHCP, I'd either replace the Spectrum router entirely with an EdgeRouter Lite (~$95 from Amazon) and do it all there to keep things nice and simple, or run a Linux VM, probably Fedora or CentOS, to do this. Keep it simple. Everything does DHCP and DHS, there is no upside to having something special for that.
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I would certainly not bother to setup a different DHCP and DNS solution as a primary goal of a home lab setup.
Those services exist pretty much everywhere.
What is your goal for the home lab setup? I mean you can set something up for DHCP and DNS if you really want to, but I would focus on tasks that are more expected to be of benefit to you than DHCP and DNS.
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I run a CentOS VM that does both recursive DNS (bind) and DHCP (dhcpd) for my home network.
2 vCPUS and 1G RAM which is more than plenty for the role in my environment.
I have dhcpd set up to do dynamic DNS updates so that my dynamic clients are reachable via hostname. Works really well.
I have an EdgeRouter PoE and have found that it is not as quick at resolving DNS than BIND in my environment.
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@anthonyh said in Home Network Setup:
2 vCPUS and 1G RAM which is more than plenty for the role in my environment.
1vCPU and 512MB should do that fine.
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I copied Anthonyh's setup, but I used Ubuntu 16.04 server, and it works very well, the DNS response time is significantly faster than from my off the shelf asus router. It was a great learning experience.
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@scottalanmiller said in Home Network Setup:
@anthonyh said in Home Network Setup:
2 vCPUS and 1G RAM which is more than plenty for the role in my environment.
1vCPU and 512MB should do that fine.
That's what my Pi-Hole has assigned, both of them do just fine, is quick, and does a good job of making add domains just go away.
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@jaredbusch honestly, at home I tend to mimic what I have in the office. It's nowhere near it obviously. I'm pro Ubiquiti for the office along with HP when needed and DELL for my servers
My time sometimes goes far in between before I do brand new infrastructure setups. So for me, it's just practice and learning. I typically find that I'm more entertained how I can do more with linux (depends on my caffeine intake for the day) that might have a steep learning curve but in the end its worth it.
I don't care what anyone says lol fixing my Ubuntu box with my Unifi Controller was a labor of love but I got it working and I dare not touch it
But for me I plan on deleting, remaking it and going back through the whole process to hopefully learn to do it faster and better and keep the commands properly documented.I eventually plan on doing the same with the Ubiquiti NVR.
I kinda do wish Ubiquiti made their router work on x86 that would have actually made my day but its all good I realize PFsense is kinda where I need to put my attention back on. I have installed it and used it successfully in the past.
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@krisleslie The EdgeRouter line's OS is based on Vyatta OS which you can run on x86 hardware. Check this out: https://vyos.io/
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@krisleslie said in Home Network Setup:
I kinda do wish Ubiquiti made their router work on x86 that would have actually made my day but its all good I realize PFsense is kinda where I need to put my attention back on. I have installed it and used it successfully in the past.
Just use VyOS if you want to mimick EdgeOS. Don't run a router on x86. Get a Ubiquiti ERL.
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Also for me focusing on non-profits, I like to take something that is possibly not the "best or beast setup" and figure out how can I make it better. In my head with virtualization th,ere is almost 0 excuses with every non-profit in america isn't virtualized to go along with our other allotments.
I can do more with a Dell Power Edge 710 and a few dollars spent on networking gear, ram than I could have imagined years ago. I was definitely a late adopter to virtualization. I wish had I took the time when I worked enterprise, I could have made some smart decisions to have our company save some $.
But nothing makes me more happy than knowing I am saving our non profit and our clients $ by the more I can learn.
that drives me each day. -
Good point it is VyOS.
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@scottalanmiller said in Home Network Setup:
@anthonyh said in Home Network Setup:
2 vCPUS and 1G RAM which is more than plenty for the role in my environment.
1vCPU and 512MB should do that fine.
You're probably right.
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@krisleslie said in Home Network Setup:
Also for me focusing on non-profits, I like to take something that is possibly not the "best or beast setup" and figure out how can I make it better. In my head with virtualization th,ere is almost 0 excuses with every non-profit in america isn't virtualized to go along with our other allotments.
I can do more with a Dell Power Edge 710 and a few dollars spent on networking gear, ram than I could have imagined years ago. I was definitely a late adopter to virtualization. I wish had I took the time when I worked enterprise, I could have made some smart decisions to have our company save some $.
But nothing makes me more happy than knowing I am saving our non profit and our clients $ by the more I can learn.
that drives me each day.That's why Ubiquiti is perfect. You can do even more with your time for them instead of spending lots of resources on pfSense when you can have something better for a few bucks.
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Any value to trying to use DNS/DHCP for Windows domains on something other than Windows? It drops the need for Windows CALs for DNS/DHCP use.
If so, does UBNT based gear support dynamic DNS?
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@dashrender said in Home Network Setup:
Any value to trying to use DNS/DHCP for Windows domains on something other than Windows? It drops the need for Windows CALs for DNS/DHCP use.
If so, does UBNT based gear support dynamic DNS?
If the environment is utilizing Active Directory I think sticking with with MS DNS is best (I'm sure there are ways around it if you replicate the various DNS records AD creates, but IMO it may be more headache than it's worth). However, you can use other DHCP solutions. We do not use MS DHCP and have no issues.
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@dashrender said in Home Network Setup:
If so, does UBNT based gear support dynamic DNS?
DDNS? Like for external use?
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This is overkill but it’s me trying to run my house like a real system. I have dual CentOS BIND DNS servers and a CentOS DHCP server. The DHCP server is running on KVM, DNS servers are on OpenStack. Ansible updates one DNS server, reboots it, then moves to the other and does the same. It does that every night. DNS and DHCP are great practice for automation. All of my stuff (home and work) uses reservations so I just add a server to my dictionary and it’s created by Ansible in both DNS and DHCP at the same time.
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@scottalanmiller said in Home Network Setup:
@dashrender said in Home Network Setup:
If so, does UBNT based gear support dynamic DNS?
DDNS? Like for external use?
DDNS yes, but for internal. Windows DNS is dynamic DNS, as machines come and go from the network, they join and DNS, and update IP if changed.
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@dashrender said in Home Network Setup:
@scottalanmiller said in Home Network Setup:
@dashrender said in Home Network Setup:
If so, does UBNT based gear support dynamic DNS?
DDNS? Like for external use?
DDNS yes, but for internal. Windows DNS is dynamic DNS, as machines come and go from the network, they join and DNS, and update IP if changed.
Oh, that's not Dynanic DNS as I know the term. That's just DHCP based automation.
