Untangle home

[Theldron]

Hi all,

 

I want to install a filtering, firewall, adblocker and AV solution for home. I want to be able to setup seperate filtering for the 3 kids and my wife and I.

 

I was looking at Untangle as looks polished setup and would be easy for my wife to use if she needed to. I don't want another PC running due to costs, so would like to set this up as a VM on my media PC.

 

What are people's thoughts?

 

I know of PFSense (played with it a little) and Sophos (use it at school), but not sure how they would be as setup in a home.

 

This is my media PC, I have just brought 8GB ram for it. Just don't want to experience any bottlenecking on it.

 

Can buy a couple of intel NICs if needed.

 

 

Cheers

[ADMaster]

The last time I looked at untangle, it didn't have that great of filtering unless you got the subscription. I don't know what you are looking to pay.

I use Sophos utm 9 home edition. I run it on a dedicated old box with 2 nics, but I'm sure you can put it on a VM too.

The reporting isn't the greatest, but it is the best free home network filter I've found.

https://www.sophos.com/en-us/products/free-tools/sophos-utm-home-edition.aspx

[TwistedHelixis]

Not exactly what you are asking for but this has been great in my home. It works on phones, tablets and computers, and even on phones with WiFi disabled.

 

https://www.qustodio.com/en/family/how-it-works/

[Theldron]

The last time I looked at untangle, it didn't have that great of filtering unless you got the subscription. I don't know what you are looking to pay.

I use Sophos utm 9 home edition. I run it on a dedicated old box with 2 nics, but I'm sure you can put it on a VM too.

The reporting isn't the greatest, but it is the best free home network filter I've found.

https://www.sophos.com/en-us/products/free-tools/sophos-utm-home-edition.aspx

 

Thanks, I dont mind paying the $50 a year for the homepro Untangle to be honest. I just want something with virus protection, web filtering per user of device, adblocker etc. In one place.

 

I have looked at Sophos UTM as a number of my schools use it. But I don't find it that user friendly and need something that my wife could find her way round if needed.

 

Cheers

 

- - - Updated - - -

 

Not exactly what you are asking for but this has been great in my home. It works on phones, tablets and computers, and even on phones with WiFi disabled.

 

https://www.qustodio.com/en/family/how-it-works/

 

Thanks mate, we currently use Qustodio but I am looking for an all round, setup to be honest.

 

Cheers though

[ADMaster]

To go back to the question of using a VM or not;

I think you will have plenty of spec depending on bandwidth. I only have a measly 4 mpbs at home, so my 10 year old box with 1.5 GB of ram does fine. The best advice I have is set it up and do some tests so you know how it performs on your network.

My only concern about using a VM is how easy it would be to bypass? My dedicated box is physically inline, you’re not getting passed it without moving cables.

I don’t know the age / tech savviness of your kids it may not be an issue yet, but dns / gateways are easily changed. Your home router may have tools it place to prevent this, it may not. I’m just putting the question out there for you to think about, test and decide.

[Theldron]

Hi, thanks for your response.

 

Our fibre connection is Plunet 30/10 with an Plusnet fibre router?

With your dedicated box how does it do the wireless? Do you have a separate WAP?

My kids are 6 & 9 not very tech savvy, though the 1 year old is starting to show some aptitude lol.

 

I would prefer to use a physical box, but concerned about the extra electric cost as it would be on all the time, along with the NAS. Though I have just got rid of 2 high powered gaming machines that were used alot by the kids for streaming and have got them laptops, so can't be more than that.

[ADMaster]

I have a separate wap

rj 11 ADSL line into modem put in bridged mode

rj 45 out into wan nic of sophos this is what gets the public IP.

rj45 out of lan nic into a switch / wifi.

 

All the dns / dhcp is done on the sophos box so there is no conflicts there.

 

After doing a bit of reading up, it sounds like you really should have two nics, unless your just doing a demo.

Two nics should eliminate the bypass concerns I was talking about.

Here is some reading for you.

 

https://forums.untangle.com/installation/40710-untangle-vm-bad-idea.html

https://forums.untangle.com/hardware/37943-install-untangle-only-one-network-card.html

[Theldron]

Cheers mate. Looks like I will have to have a second machine for untangle, I just need to make sure it is silent otherwise the OH will not be impressed.

 

Thanks for all your help mate.