Anyone use untangle at home?

R

Red Squirrel

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I'm thinking of using the free untangle version at home. I'm demoing it in a VM here at work since it's a slow day, but noticed it won't boot. The green bar goes about 90% then just stalls. Think I'll get better luck on a true hardware machine?
 
i do, but mainly only because i deploy it to my clients too, and so more time with it the better... certainly overkill for home use, but hey, we got the hardware, then whats the big deal?

i don't know, but untangle seems to be getting a little bloated for my tastes... thinking of maybe switching back to ipcop... or trying pfsense again...

i seemed to have a lot less stability issues with ipcop, but it also wasn't nearly as powerful out of the box
 
Yup..check the hardware compatibility list over there. I used the silver bullet a few times (the Windows based little VM dealio on a USB drive)...just to dork around with, but the Windows version was disco'd quite a while ago, I didn't even think it was still able to be downloaded.

Proper hardware is the key to your success with Untangle...good Intel chipset motherboards 'n NICs. Do it right, and it'll run for a year or so needing a reboot only to do a major upgrade of it to the latest version.

The latest 7.4 version lightened up RAM consumption quite a bit.
 
I have an older box I'll probably be using, eventually get something better. For home use on a 5mbps DSL line it should be fine though right? It's not like I'll have gbps of traffic going through it.

Been reading up and it really seems to do everything I've ever wanted in a home router solution. The reporting looks very awesome. I probably wont be using the web filtering and that stuff but I could see myself using the QOS and antivirus and of course the routing part.
 
Red Squirrel said:
I have an older box I'll probably be using, eventually get something better. For home use on a 5mbps DSL line it should be fine though right? It's not like I'll have gbps of traffic going through it.

Been reading up and it really seems to do everything I've ever wanted in a home router solution. The reporting looks very awesome. I probably wont be using the web filtering and that stuff but I could see myself using the QOS and antivirus and of course the routing part.
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I have clients that have networks of 20 and more PCs, with Untangle running on old early gen P4s...I'm talking the old hyperthread P4 northwoods..2.4, 6, or 8 GHz, 1 gig of RAM...10 or 16 meg internet pipes...runs fine.
 
I love this software, running it at home for my home business, Just bought a new case and motherboard cor2duo 2.0 with 2 gigs ram 160gig spare sata drive. Untangle runs AWESEOME! Best firewall software i have ever used. Also have a VPN working very good.

Worth using and learning!!
 
Have Untangle running on ESXi at home. Untangle serves as the router/dhcp and primary firewall. The same server is running Server08, and both are in the same internal vlan configured within ESXi. Untangle is connected to Server08's AD service via its directory connector add-on. Everything works like a charm :)
 
Nice to hear, when I get the chance I will definably try it out. I actually have a VPN server VM that uses open VPN, so if I use untangle for that, I can retire that VM too.

It does not appear to based on when I played with it real quick, but does that version of openVPN have better permission options? I'd like to be able to give other people access to my network but only give them access to certain IPs.
 
Astaro is pretty nice too. I'm going ot be trying both it and untangle on a little supermicro 1U i picked up. See which one I like better.
 
Hallis said:
Astaro is pretty nice too. I'm going ot be trying both it and untangle on a little supermicro 1U i picked up. See which one I like better.
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just installed astaro the other night as well on an old p4 rig... was pretty complicated coming from pfsense and having to allow outbound connections individually.. got so tedious i just allowed all outbound.

Hoooked up 2 wans to it and it worked perfectly.. nothing crazy to configure like in pfsense and antivirus protection to boot!
 
Red Squirrel said:
It does not appear to based on when I played with it real quick, but does that version of openVPN have better permission options? I'd like to be able to give other people access to my network but only give them access to certain IPs.
Click to expand...

Yes, in Untangle, you can first create/define "address pools", such as the whole network..ie 192.168.1.0, or a smaller IP range or individual IP. When you add OpenVPN users, you select which address pool to give them.
 
I use it at home in transparent mode behind my pfSense box. I don't use the Untangle firewall module.
 
I love the Untangle software. It's very good.

I have mine on a Cor2 duo 2.0 with 2 gigs ram, installed Untangle 7.3 64bit, Rock stable fast.

I had 7.3 32bit on a p4 2.4 with 1.5 gigs ram and it was slow :( The cor2duo is quieter less heat less power and WAY faster. Probably helps that i have dual gbit intel network cards now, instead of some cheap dlink 530's.

Pics ?

Evertying is in a Norco 2 u case.

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untangle-dellrack.jpg
 
I had Untangle on a Dell Poweredge 1750 in my basement, had it up for i think almost 4 weeks solid. But then one day i decided to play around with QoS and stuff and see if i could get my speedtest scores up back to 20+mbs, got it up to 14mbs from 9.7mbs ( uploads were consistant 3.8) and then accident turn on the config wizard.... I closed it as i didnt want to change anything and well... It quit responding.

Which is okay, I started having issues with getting lag in MW2, even with everything turned off in Untangle. Set my dd-wrt router back up and the lag is long gone and my speedtest scores are way back up.

I think it maybe have been the broadcom nics. Everyone on the untangle foruma seem to swear by the intel nics. With 3coms coming right behind those.

Im getting ready to order Netgears beast of a router (3700) or play with an x86 version dd-wrt in Vmware.

I treid astro on the 1750, it went into a kernal panic. And pfsense wont forward ports at all. Still playing with it though.
 
I'm not a fan of firewalls in a VM...there's something inside of me demanding that the firewall is a totally separate physical box from the rest of your LAN. The have already been exploits against VMWare, there will be lots more as it grows in popularity. I know you can isolate the red NIC in VMWare...I just...it's gotta be a physically separate box for me.

Also, Untangle, and other UTM distros, need full access to the CPU for optimal performance. Untangle does not like to share the CPU. And being a layer 7 appliance...I don't like the fact that it's doubled up on the NICs in VMWare. I'd rather have Untangle (or any router distro) talking DIRECTLY to the NICs..instead of talking to another operating system when then talks directly to the NICs. It's like...another hop, if you know what I mean.

VMWare is cool for quickly learning a distro though, I've used it at home to piddle with other distros just to dork around with them, for a while I was running my home lan behind ClearOS, which is another very cool distro..it's like an open sourced version of Small Business Server Premium....file sharing, mail server, remote access, proxy server, web server, database, etc etc.
 
YeOldeStonecat said:
I'm not a fan of firewalls in a VM...there's something inside of me demanding that the firewall is a totally separate physical box from the rest of your LAN. The have already been exploits against VMWare, there will be lots more as it grows in popularity. I know you can isolate the red NIC in VMWare...I just...it's gotta be a physically separate box for me.

Also, Untangle, and other UTM distros, need full access to the CPU for optimal performance. Untangle does not like to share the CPU. And being a layer 7 appliance...I don't like the fact that it's doubled up on the NICs in VMWare. I'd rather have Untangle (or any router distro) talking DIRECTLY to the NICs..instead of talking to another operating system when then talks directly to the NICs. It's like...another hop, if you know what I mean.

VMWare is cool for quickly learning a distro though, I've used it at home to piddle with other distros just to dork around with them, for a while I was running my home lan behind ClearOS, which is another very cool distro..it's like an open sourced version of Small Business Server Premium....file sharing, mail server, remote access, proxy server, web server, database, etc etc.
Click to expand...

I agree with this, the firewall / router should be a separate box. I am looking to learn vm ware and how it works and is used. Not for untangle tho, just for personal and learning for business stuff.
 
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