Internet is much faster after switching from PiHole to AdguardHome reddit / selfhosted ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ButtScratcher9 · 2023-12-03 12:05 Just to start off, I have basic knowledge when it comes to networking and DNS setup. ​ I had PiHole installed for over a year, ad blocking working fine but there was unexplained lag/slowness across the devices. ​ My internet is not bad, 350mbps 5G home (no other options available in my area). ​ For example: \-Videos on X (Twitter) and TikTok would take around 3 to 5 seconds to load and start playing. When switching to mobile carrier data it is loading instantly. \-Github pulls frequently fail even though the domain is whitelisted. ​ Recently I decided to change from PiHole to Adguard Home, it's been over a week now and internet is much much faster. the above mentioned examples are not an happening anymore. overall browsing is also faster. ​ I don't know what was causing the issue with PiHole but I thought I would share this experience in case someone else is having similar issues. ​ I would also be very interested to know any logical explanation to this experience. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- RedditSlayer2020 · 2023-12-03 12:13 maybe adguard home using different upstream DNS servers ---------------------------------------------------------------------- javijuji · 2023-12-03 12:32 You should run dns benchmark to see if you have high latency to some of the upstream servers. Then select accordingly. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- thekrautboy · 2023-12-03 13:16 Using different settings, different upstream DNS. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- owly89 · 2023-12-03 13:56 GRC DNS benchmark? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- javijuji · 2023-12-03 14:22 Seems to be the preferred one. Personally I use Quad9 DNS servers but I've also had good results with OpenDNS. If you want a direct comparison you could check the DNS servers being used by your Adguard installation and use the same ones on pi-hole to test it out. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Sekhen · 2023-12-03 14:46 Using unbound locally is the way forward. Single digit milliseconds for DNS. Couldn't be happier with my Pihole. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- YankeesIT · 2023-12-03 15:13 You don’t need unbound with adguard home. It has caching built in. I avg 3 to 5ms ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Sekhen · 2023-12-03 15:59 We don't need any of the stuff we run at home. We still run it. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- bombero_kmn · 2023-12-03 16:55 Never heard of or considered this, thanks for the tip! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- FromHereToEscape · 2023-12-03 17:02 Can you share a screenshot of your DNS settings page on your PiHole? Are both PiHole and AGH set to use the same upstream DNS servers? Have you run ping tests from the hosting device to those DNS server addresses? Just a guess, but the delay you're referencing sounds like it might be a DNS lookup timeout or conflict. Are your router settings the same? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Barentineaj · 2023-12-03 17:20 Unbound isn’t just about caching. It also allows you to completely bypass all of the big public DNS resolvers such as Google, OpenDNS, Your ISP, ETC and go directly to the Root DNS servers. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- trexxeon · 2023-12-03 17:20 Switched from pi-hole to technitium. So much faster. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Ieris19 · 2023-12-03 18:06 Well, that isn’t always better. DNS is hierarchical for a reason and sometimes the ISP cache or another DNS server will know where you should go without having to query the big servers ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Barentineaj · 2023-12-03 18:15 That is true. Querying root servers yourself is a little slower at first, but I actually noticed an increase in speed after about a week of usage compared to my ISP’s DNS. IMO the biggest use case is privacy, I personally don’t like the Idea of my ISP, Google, ETC knowing exactly what sites I’m visiting, and how much. My data is my data, this is a bit more of an extreme example, but too many people are willing or may not even be aware at how much personal data they give for convenience. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- barkingcat · 2023-12-03 18:28 don't know why you're being downvoted. 99.9999% of all things on selfhosted/homelab are "I don't really need it, but it's cool so I run it" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- pentesticals · 2023-12-03 21:42 How big were your feeds? Of you have gigabytes of hosts in your list it could have some performance issues. Otherwise it’s probably just a config issue causing it be slower. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- CyberBlaed · 2023-12-03 23:18 Tis worth it, but also AdGuard has its own analytics on its admin page with how long some take to respond. From my end; tls://adblock.doh.mullvad.net:853 422 ms tls://dns.google:853 34 ms tls://dns11.quad9.net:853 32 ms tls://security.cloudflare-dns.com:853 30 ms quic://dns.adguard-dns.com:853 21 ms tls://dns.nextdns.io:853 17 ms and this is on FTTP, NBN Australia. (If I use their direct IP addresses, then its 2-3ms for Google and Cloudflare while 20-50+ms for everything else) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- phin586 · 2023-12-03 23:43 They still know what sites you are visiting. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Internal-Initial-835 · 2023-12-04 00:35 unbound with dnscrypt gives the caching and rotating dnscrypt dns servers to keep even your dns history out of logs. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Internal-Initial-835 · 2023-12-04 00:38 most unbound setups i've seen use dnscrypt to prevent people knowing your history. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- phin586 · 2023-12-04 00:47 They still know where you are going. They still route your ip to where it needs to be. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Internal-Initial-835 · 2023-12-04 00:53 Yes but who knows where I’m looking up? If every request unbound can’t satisfy it requested from a different anonymous upstream server somebody would have a hard time painting any kind of picture and that’s the point. If somebody is monitoring the other end then yes they can see my ip but if I’m using a decent vpn that counts for nothing they will get my vpn ip on a vpn that keeps no logs. The unbound and dnscrypt proxy setup is to stop dns leaks. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- phin586 · 2023-12-04 01:06 Well if you are routing all of your traffic over vpn, sure. You’d already be routing dns request as well though as well ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Enrage · 2023-12-04 03:14 Unless you are using a VPN, your ISP can still see your traffic. You can hide DNS records, but your ISP will be routing your packets and will have the corresponding Netflow data. Its not that hard to figure out what sites a customer is visiting, Note that they cant see the actual traffic itself, just the destination address. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- kumbaya_03802 · 2023-12-04 06:10 >IMO the biggest use case is privacy, I personally don’t like the Idea of my ISP, Google, ETC knowing exactly what sites I’m visiting, and how much. I'm not sure about that. Unbound still needs to piggyback on another upstream DNS server to encrypt its traffic on either DoH, DoT, or DoC. Your ISP can still snoop on your unencrypted DNS traffic. It's a matter of who you gonna trust in terms of privacy (your ISP or your recursive resolver). It's hard to say Unbound is better. I would go with an outside recursive DNS resolver (Cloudflare, Quad9, etc.) over Unbound mainly because of the lower latency & more cache hits than a local authoritative DNS server and add another layer to the mix like [Cloudflare Zero Trust](https://developers.cloudflare.com/cloudflare- one/connections/connect-networks/private-net/cloudflared/private-dns/) private tunnel. At least you can connect an internal DNS resolver to cloudflare & use it to resolve non-publicly routed domains. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- p4ck3ts · 2023-12-04 06:22 did you run unbound? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- National-Dust-2194 · 2023-12-04 07:47 You should run benchmarks before trying to declare that something is faster or slower. DNS is going to have a very minimal impact on your overall network performance ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Internal-Initial-835 · 2023-12-04 09:23 You can route dns through the vpn but in my experience and possibly the fact that I self host a lot means using vpn dns is comparatively slow, it’s largely uncached and sometimes you just don’t want all your eggs in a single basket. You still get dns leaks from software that insists on using the system or network dns settings. You can’t control some apps or devices if you’re using a vpn as a gateway and so ensuring any “other” dns lookups are “safe”. That’s why I stated it’s use to prevent dns leaks :) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Internal-Initial-835 · 2023-12-04 09:31 Exactly and they will know you’re using a vpn if they’re looking at you already. They will also know which vpn and if they keep logs. Some don’t agree but i prefer to keep things to myself. I don’t need a vpn or to hide dns lookups. I’m not doing anything I shouldn’t be. I just don’t want some random company or person having that much insight into my life. It’s personal preference and largely just because I find it fun and I can. There’s also a side benefit in that if my kids do something they maybe shouldn’t I know first and I can prevent it reoccurring and also a potential knock at the door. My kids are at the ages now where they know just enough to get themselves into trouble 🤣🤣 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- phin586 · 2023-12-04 13:42 Well if you are somehow connecting to root dns servers with encryption and you are sending 100% of your traffic over a trusted vpn that isn’t tied to your person in anyway, sure you are pretty secure. However that’s still putting a lot of effort when I could most fire up xhamster the ol fashion way or really go obscure and break out the old box of mags. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Internal-Initial-835 · 2023-12-04 13:55 lol. Yeah. It’s not about the effort but it didn’t take a lot of setup in all fairness. I wanted to see how it worked. I didn’t plan on keeping it but it worked really well so I thought why not and years later it’s still going :) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- danhm · 2023-12-04 15:20 If you use Linux, this runs perfectly in Wine. Or, if you are lazy like me and don't want to install Wine, add it as a game in Steam and use Proton. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- mattisz · 2023-12-04 21:55 Saw this and remembered that I made a docker image of this when I needed it. Just uploaded it to DH & GH in case it helps someone else. [https://github.com/mattisz/gibson- dns](https://github.com/mattisz/gibson-dns) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- oh19contp · 2023-12-06 07:33 i couldnt get unbound to work properly and gave up. just using cloudflare at the moment :/