Pi-Hole and Custom DNS with EE Fibre and WiFi Extenders - CURRENTLY INCOMPATIBLE

[burratha]

I have recently joined EE and have the 900 fibre package, and have EE WiFi extenders.

My current setup:

Router (EE Router) DHCP and DNS DISABLED

Pi-Hole. DHCP and DNS ENABLED - the Pi-Hole is providing DNS and distributing IP addresses on my network.

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PROBLEM: When the above configuration is enabled, the WiFi extenders are not recognised as such by the system and are treated like other clients on the network. Therefore the 'mesh' functionality of the system will not work.

CURRENT SOLUTION: Remove the Pi-Hole and allow the router to control the DHCP allocation and DNS.

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I won't do this, as the EE (BT) DNS servers are too restrictive and also do not allow any flexibility for me as a parent and responsible adult. For context, I use a third party paid provider (control-D) to manage my internet content and block adverts and malware accordingly.

Question: I believe it is possible to edit the configuration files of the Raspberry Pi (Pi-Hole) to allow the discs to be seen by the router, which will then allow the full functionality to operate as expected. 

Can someone please assist me in the intricacies of editing a .conf file or two in the /etc/dnsmasq.d folder and get this thing working?

Thanks in advance

Steve

[Pindu]

Hi Leanne - Yes, it is after I try the steps above I get lost connection to the API. I have tried assigning the extender a different IP address to but no joy still. Thanks

[Leanne_T]

Thanks for coming back to me @Pindu 

In this case, please call us and the broadband technical team will get this looked into for you. 

Leanne.

[bobpullen]

@Pindu - make sure you haven't assigned a static DHCP reservation to the extender in the Pihole GUI before hand. If you have, delete the entry as the manual dhcpcd config will look after this and it probably won't like two reservations for the same address.

I've looked back through my notes and the only other thing I think @burratha did between receiving the API error and things working was to rebuild/reinstall Pihole itself. Hopefully they'll be along in due course to advise if anything else was attempted.

[burratha]

Afternoon, all.

I actually asked for the return of my BT Halo kit, and found the extenders work fine on that system (and are fully visible) even when using an external DHCP/DNS server.

Unofrunately, I could not live with the EE kit - I found it restrictive and clumsy with key options disabled (such as DDNS).

I hope your own attempt to fix your issue are successful, though!

[Pindu]

Thanks @bobpullen  - So if I remove static IP reservation I no longer get the API error so thats good.

Unfortunately, no devices showing as connected to the samrt wifi extender still though :-(. 
@burratha  - My BT kit used to work a treat too. Very disappointed with EE kit.

[bobpullen]

Update for anybody who comes across this post and is experiencing similar problems when using their own DHCP server:   I've I've since found that things seem much better on the more recent 2.x firmware builds.

Following a factory reset of my Smart Hub Plus, I can remove the workaround described here and everything now works as expected 🙂

[Pindu]

Thanks @bobpullen 

Indeed it does. I also factory reset all my my equipment and for good measure, rebuilt my pi and pihole. All is good now in the EE home network.