I bought a Synology RT2600ac, and I'm liking it. I wanted more granular parental controls than I could do with OpenWRT, and I'm pretty happy with
the controls. The control I was looking for was cumulative time online - I want my kids off of the net after dinner, but also want to limit their daily time. You can create profiles by MAC address easily.

There's a DNS server app, VPN server that looks pretty nice, and it uses a desktop interface similar to DSM, their management environment for NASes.

The only two things missing are a VPN *client* and static host names. I want to use a public domain name, and override a few hostnames with a static host file. With the Synology DNS server, it assumes it's authoritative for the
zone and won't pass along requests it doesn't know about. I suppose I could set up the whole external zone internally, but I don't like leaking private
IP information outside.


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Re: Synology Routers
By: poindexter FORTRAN to All on Sun Nov 06 2022 08:21 am

I bought a Synology RT2600ac, and I'm liking it. I wanted more granular parental controls than I could do with OpenWRT, and I'm pretty happy with the controls. The control I was looking for was cumulative time online - I want my kids off of the net after dinner, but also want to limit their daily time. You can create profiles by MAC address easily.

your kids are going to spend a lot of time at their friend's houses.
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On 11/6/22 09:21, poindexter FORTRAN wrote:

I bought a Synology RT2600ac, and I'm liking it. I wanted more granular parental controls than I could do with OpenWRT, and I'm pretty happy with
the controls. The control I was looking for was cumulative time online - I want my kids off of the net after dinner, but also want to limit their daily time. You can create profiles by MAC address easily.

I'm using an intel N6005 based router box (via ali express), with
opnsense, which has been working pretty well. I could have configured
with proxmox, and opnsense as a vm, but I have a separate home server
(running proxmox).

For vpn, I have a vm on my home server running wireguard. I also have
pihole in another vm.

Didn't know Synology made routers, I've used a few of their NAS devices
over the years.
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Michael J. Ryan - tracker1@roughneckbbs.com
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Tracker1 wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

I'm using an intel N6005 based router box (via ali express), with opnsense, which has been working pretty well. I could have configured with proxmox, and opnsense as a vm, but I have a separate home server (running proxmox).

I'm old-school, prefer a separate router box. I've seen videos on YouTube running Opnsense/pFsense as a VM, and it doesn't *feel* right to me.

I ran pfSense at work for some time, like it a lot.

Didn't know Synology made routers, I've used a few of their NAS devices over the years.

It was news to me, too. Their OS and UI is a little limited compared to OpenWRT, but the parental controls are nice. What sold me on it was the cumulative time limits - I can limit my kids' total time per day, not just what times of day they can log on.


... If it isn't broken, I can fix it.
--- MultiMail/DOS v0.52
þ Synchronet þ .: realitycheckbbs.org :: scientia potentia est :.

It was news to me, too. Their OS and UI is a little limited compared to OpenWRT, but the parental controls are nice. What sold me on it was the cumulative time limits - I can limit my kids' total time per day, not just what times of day they can log on.

My router from xfinity does this as well. Time limits, times of day, and day of week can all be configured independently.

I have that as the main network, and a tp link er605 in the DMZ as our VPN network build out between 5 other friends. It's kinda fun. One guy has a PBX system and we all have phones, and the ham radio repeaters are all linked via the network as well.

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Re: Re: Synology Routers
By: Phantomrage to poindexter FORTRAN on Fri Nov 11 2022 03:40 pm

It was news to me, too. Their OS and UI is a little limited compared to OpenWRT, but the parental controls are nice. What sold me on it was the cumulative time limits - I can limit my kids' total time per day, not just what times of day they can log on.

My router from xfinity does this as well. Time limits, times of day, and day of week can all be configured independently.

I have that as the main network, and a tp link er605 in the DMZ as our VPN network build out between 5 other friends. It's kinda fun. One guy has a PBX system and we all have phones, and the ham radio repeaters are all linked via the network as well.

yeah, but in the case of kids, it's best to just talk to them instead of micromanaging them with technology. My son was a gamer and i'd tell him that he should turn it off and give his mind a rest before going to bed. I even let him play up until bedtime so he knew i was right. his mind was still racing and it was hard to get to sleep.
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Phantomrage wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

My router from xfinity does this as well. Time limits, times of day,
and day of week can all be configured independently.

Call me paranoid, but I don't want Comcast touching my LAN at all - I have
my cable modem in bridge mode.


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Call me paranoid, but I don't want Comcast touching my LAN at all - I have
my cable modem in bridge mode.

I don't like it but the family wants it easy. That is the reason for the two networks. The family one, and mine. Then again, they can probably see everything on doing on the ER605 even with it on the 'outside'. I would like to get a new modem, and get away from the rental anyhow.

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On 11/10/22 07:08, poindexter FORTRAN wrote:

I'm using an intel N6005 based router box (via ali express), with
opnsense, which has been working pretty well. I could have configured
with proxmox, and opnsense as a vm, but I have a separate home server
(running proxmox).

I'm old-school, prefer a separate router box. I've seen videos on YouTube running Opnsense/pFsense as a VM, and it doesn't *feel* right to me.

Mostly the same... it's just a bit OP for just the home routing it's
doing currently. It also feels wierd to have two lan connections to the switch (one for proxmox, one for passthrough to opnsense), I didn't feel comfortable that I'd get it setup correctly, and wanted to get through
it relatively quickly (not taking the internet down too long).

I ran pfSense at work for some time, like it a lot.

I didn't/don't have much experience with either... they say opnsense is
easier (started as a fork of pfsense), but it's not that easy as far as
I'm concerned... works for my simple use case, kind of wish I just bound
the three non-wlan ports as a vlan... so right now only one internal
port really does anything.

Didn't know Synology made routers, I've used a few of their NAS devices
over the years.

It was news to me, too. Their OS and UI is a little limited compared to OpenWRT, but the parental controls are nice. What sold me on it was the cumulative time limits - I can limit my kids' total time per day, not just what times of day they can log on.

That's cool... about the only thing I've considered doing is isolating
the cameras to a separate lan with more restricted access (they uplink
for recording, and don't really want them having access to my internal
lan)... they're isolated via a separate wireless router for now, but
would like to integrate, but keep on separate lan... thankfully my wifi supports multiple SSID segments with different dhcp and routing.

Either way, hopefully getting all the network gear into the upstairs
closet (wiring for cat6e with shielded termination.. overkill, but
pretty much future proof on the house side. Since interest rates will
keep me here a few more years, may as well get it done.
--
Michael J. Ryan - tracker1@roughneckbbs.com
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