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Synology NAS Pihole

cyberwasp
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Synology NAS Pihole

Is anyone out there running a Netgear Nighthawk rax50 connected to a synology disk station running Pihole. After replacing the first RAX50, This one lets me Change The DNS server to point to the NAS. However, Pihole is not filtering anything from my web browsing as ads are still popping up. 

 

I've tried numerous calls and chats with tech support. The last of whch hungup on me 3 times. TIA

 

 

P.S. If I'm in the wrong forum, my apologies. I have searched up and down the Model drop down menu but do no see a RAX50 . Have also come up empty looking for a forum list anywhere.

Message 1 of 5
Razor512
Prodigy

Re: Synology NAS Pihole

Make sure your client devices are getting their DNS settings from the DHCP server in the router. Also if you have software such as PIA or other commercian VPN servers installed, they will often override your DNS settings even for non-VPN traffic.

 

Furthermore, the pi-hole does not work on ads that are loaded via obfuscated scripts. For example, many sites will try to get arond DNS filters by using randomly generated domain names.

 

If you look as many of the pages with obnoxious ads, you will notice that a trend now is to see a first party provided script using XHR which will load obnoxious ads from a random domain. Since part of the content is from the first party, you can't block the domain, and since the script uses some kind of time based script that periodically uses a different domain, pi-home can't keep up with it it.

 

In those cases, your only hope is to use browser based ad blocking such as ublock origin.

 

Beyond that, routers will also cache DNS info.

 

Also be sure to check if the pihole is properly weorking. In windows, set the pihole as the primary and secondary DNS, and then see if it blocks some of the known ad domains.

Message 2 of 5
Razor512
Prodigy

Re: Synology NAS Pihole

Sorry for the typos, the site lacks an edit button.

 

Beyond that, to be clear, a pi-hole will fail to block most modern ads, especially from recent months where many sites have been trying to circumvent DNS based ad blocking.

If possible look at the filters the pi-hole is using and then in your browser, attempt to load something from one of those domains that you have not visited before. Also check if it offers any logs on what it blocked

 

Beyond that, consider using ublock origin on your browser.

Message 3 of 5
cyberwasp
Star

Re: Synology NAS Pihole

Razor512 Actually Pihole isn't my problem. It's getting the DNS Server setting to take hold. I put it in like the attachment shows and save it. However it didn't work. I think I stumble on it by mistake. You have to set the  router MAC Adress to, "Use This MAC Address." something I never had to do with my other router. Is this correct and if not, why is it working!! And again, Thank you!!!!!!!!

Message 4 of 5
Razor512
Prodigy

Re: Synology NAS Pihole

That is quite strange, especially considering that it is a function largely for some cable modems and ONTs that have restrictions such as if you change a router without first releasing the DHCP lease, they will not assign a new IP if the MAC address has also changed.

Message 5 of 5
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