The Beauty of Having a Pi-Hole (2024) • Hacker News Board

Re: The Beauty of Having a Pi-Hole (2024)

#51

Post by bongodongobob » Mon, May 05, 2025, 5:34 PM UTC

parpfish wrote: post #37

i'd love a pihole, but networking has always been a bit of a blindspot for me. i never really understand what i'm doing, and when things break it's a game of guess'n'check which stackoverflow/gpt answer will fix it. these walkthroughs always make it look easy, but no matter how easy the set up is you can't escape the fact that you're adding a layer of complexity to the network and i just don't want to maintain it. i…

It's very straightforward. You set the IP of the pinhole for DNS in the settings of whatever is doing DHCP on your network. That's it.

Re: The Beauty of Having a Pi-Hole (2024)

#52

Post by swiftcoder » Mon, May 05, 2025, 5:34 PM UTC

FredPret wrote: post #47

jstanley wrote: post #11

I really don't understand why people go to the trouble of using Pi-hole that only blocks at the DNS level, instead of using uBlock Origin which can block at the DOM level. uBlock Origin is easier and cheaper to set up, less maintenance, and more effective.

For me it's because: - I need it to work within phone apps, my TV, on Safari, and on Chrome - I just don't trust Chrome addons. When you go to install an ad blocker, there's an extremely ominous warning about how it can read everything shown on my browser. What's worse - apparently these addons can change hands down the line, and the new owners can simply push new code. I don't want this thing phoning home with scree…

> When you go to install an ad blocker, there's an extremely ominous warning about how it can read everything shown on my browser

I'm not sure how a blocker would work if it couldn't see the content of the page...

Re: The Beauty of Having a Pi-Hole (2024)

#53

Post by bongodongobob » Mon, May 05, 2025, 5:36 PM UTC

TechDebtDevin wrote: post #42

3abiton wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I started like you, but slowly with more debugging and customized use-cases I started understanding more and more. That's the way for people with limited free time. That said, now with LLMs, honestly anything is easily learnable.

It still shouldnt break all the time. You shouldnt havr to get good at debugging a tool like this. I use but it dors destroy my network once a month and have had to build cleanup/reinstall scripts for this scenerio. I would not recommend to most people.

Did you not give the pihole a static address or something? What is breaking?

Re: The Beauty of Having a Pi-Hole (2024)

#54

Post by shrikant » Mon, May 05, 2025, 5:38 PM UTC

mikestew wrote: post #36

jamesgeck0 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't _think_ you need a whole Raspberry Pi 5 kit. It seems like an older Raspberry Pi 3b+ would get the job done for $35 or so. Maybe even a Raspberry Pi Zero ($5) with an micro usb ethernet adapter.

Oh, it will definitely work on older ones. The one I have, w/o logging in and explicitly looking, is a 3-$SOMETHING, probably 3b+. Works just fine.

My Pi-hole runs on a ~13 year old Model B, which has survived several house moves. Definitely don't need top of the line hardware for it!

Re: The Beauty of Having a Pi-Hole (2024)

#55

Post by GloriousKoji » Mon, May 05, 2025, 5:51 PM UTC

jamesgeck0 wrote: post #24

mikestew wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was shocked that TFA’s recommended kit was $155! When did Raspberry Pi’s get so pricey?

I don't _think_ you need a whole Raspberry Pi 5 kit. It seems like an older Raspberry Pi 3b+ would get the job done for $35 or so. Maybe even a Raspberry Pi Zero ($5) with an micro usb ethernet adapter.

I recommend against the Pi Zero. Once you add in the cost of the microUSB to USB-OTG adapter and the ethernet USB adapter you might as well buy a 3B or 4. Price aside it adds an extra mechanical point of failure as microUSB is not very robust.

Re: The Beauty of Having a Pi-Hole (2024)

#56

Post by freedomben » Mon, May 05, 2025, 5:58 PM UTC

gbuk2013 wrote: post #19

wang_li wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> read TFA for the iptables config that fixes those apps and devices that bypass local DNS. For example, Don't worry. All the browsers and stuff are bypassing this level of control by moving to DNS-over-HTTPS. You'll either have to deploy a TLS terminating proxy on your network, or give up on this arms race.

To be fair, if you are geeky enough to run a PiHole you will have no trouble finding the config option to turn off DoH in your browser.

True, but I want all the devices on my home network to have DoH disabled too. Most of them I can't change directly.

Re: The Beauty of Having a Pi-Hole (2024)

#57

Post by TechDebtDevin » Mon, May 05, 2025, 5:58 PM UTC

bongodongobob wrote: post #53

TechDebtDevin wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It still shouldnt break all the time. You shouldnt havr to get good at debugging a tool like this. I use but it dors destroy my network once a month and have had to build cleanup/reinstall scripts for this scenerio. I would not recommend to most people.

Did you not give the pihole a static address or something? What is breaking?

No idea, it barely works.

Re: The Beauty of Having a Pi-Hole (2024)

#58

Post by duckkg5 » Mon, May 05, 2025, 5:58 PM UTC

$155 seems like a lot. I do this with a $5 pi zero and a $5 adapter and it works flawlessly.

Re: The Beauty of Having a Pi-Hole (2024)

#59

Post by Dries007 » Mon, May 05, 2025, 5:59 PM UTC

After having some persistent issues with my previous pi-hole setup, running as an add-on on my Home Assistant rPi 5, I moved to AdGuard Home on dedicated hardware.

I run it on a rPi Zero 2W (15$), with the Waveshare Ethernet / USB HUB BOX (16$). Together with a power brick (5$) and a meh µSD card, it's very affordable. I did add a small heatsink on the CPU and left the lid off the box to improve the temperature situation (it's in a small room that easily gets warm).

Software wise I've opted for DietPi, which works great for this kind of "dedicated device" pi setup. Current up-time is 135 days, with the last reboot being likely due to a power/breaker issue. It's truly become a set and forget thing now. It also runs Tailscale (not as exit node due to USB 2.0 limited bandwidth for Ethernet) and a dynamic DNS refresh script on a timer. It still has some headroom, but I prefer to keep it rock solid and do more fancy stuff on my Home Assistant pi, which gets rebooted/updated more frequently.

I do have the option to set my DNS settings in my router (ISP provided routers don't have that option here typically), so all of my devices follow.

In combination with µBlock Origin and SponsorBlock in my browser, I almost cry every time I see the "raw" internet on other people's devices. The only remaining source of ads is if I watch YT via my TV, so if someone has ideas to make that stop, I'm all ears. (I used to pay for the discontinued Premium Basic, but I refuse to pay double for a bunch of crap "features" I don't want/need.)

Re: The Beauty of Having a Pi-Hole (2024)

#60

Post by timbit42 » Mon, May 05, 2025, 6:01 PM UTC

dvratil wrote: post #27

jstanley wrote: post #11

I really don't understand why people go to the trouble of using Pi-hole that only blocks at the DNS level, instead of using uBlock Origin which can block at the DOM level. uBlock Origin is easier and cheaper to set up, less maintenance, and more effective.

With pi-hole, you can also block telemetry from smart devices (TVs, dish washers and stuff), and if you run it on a VPN that your phone is connected to, you can also block ads and tracking in phone apps. As mentioned in the article, pi-hole complements a browser ad block, doesn't replace it.

I just don't connect those devices to any internet.