this post was submitted on 08 Sep 2024
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Privacy
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Any router from a mainstream brand is likely fine, just don't enable any of their "cloud" BS and don't use their smartphone app. I've had good luck with Asus, they have an app but you don't have to use it at all.
For security, try to enable WPA3 on your Wi-Fi networks, otherwise WPA2 is probably fine unless you're being targeted by a government-sponsored hacking operation. Choose a long password for your network.
Once you get it up and running, then worry about DNS and PiHole and VPNs and all that. Don't get in over your head.
Solid advice. I already know what brand is good in my area (Bahnhof), and I've enjoyed using Mullvad and NextDNS, so I already know what VPN and DNS I'm comfortable with.
I've always been a bit confused about the exact purpose of PiHole, what it is and such, but I'll have to read up on it and see if it fits my needs.
I've been running PiHole for awhile, in short it's your own DNS server that's configured to block DNS requests to known advertising domains. So when you load a website and it sends a DNS request to PopularAdvertisingCompany.com to load an ad, PiHole blocks the request so the ad can't be loaded. It's useful for devices that you can't put an ad blocker on, like iPhones and smart TVs and such, but can't block stuff like YouTube ads cause they come from the same domain as the videos themselves.
It also has bonus features like DNS caching which can speed up web browsing.
Is it necessary to use PiHole if I already use NextDNS? Do I need PiHole to configurate NextDNS if I want all the ads gone on each device connected to the Wi-Fi?
No, they effectively do the same thing so you can just set your router to use NextDNS and you're good.
The other thing to keep in mind with PiHole - some things are just going to break with it's default blocking, namely the Google suggested results.
i know, I know - just don't use google, but android phones/parents have a hard time not just braindead going to Google for results.
It's not the end of the world - I've trained myself to just keep scrolling to actual results.
Another feature for PiHole is local DNS - if you want, you can set up custom dnsmasq entries for self hosted/internal services.