OpenVPN Client (and server) on WRT3200ACM / Settings/Speed/Couple of questions

[jaccovdzaag]

Hi all,

Since this is my first post, and immediately a question, let me introduce myself a bit. I'm Jacco from the Netherlands. I like to fiddle around with PC's, making watercooling loops, and do some networking, building servers. On the other hand, also like to work on my old Italian cars. Buuuuut, that's another story. Might be a bit dull, such an intro, but that's about it.

Now, I'm running into some 'problems'. I'll keep the start a bit clean and simple, not wanting to scare people away with long copy-paste logfiles and stuff like that.

Here at home, I'm running an Linksys WRT3200ACM behind my ISP's router (KPN-ZTE H368N)
As for the other network items, I've got two switches, because they are users in the house itself and in the shed (with an office and stuff) but that does not matter to the questions/problems I'm having.

I've did my basic settings, which work fine. I'm not a heavy user, so the fact OpenWRT let's you choose your services is a great way to do this (coming from DDWRT where you get flushed out with settings and options).

Buuut. OpenVPN. I've followed the guides from the Wiki about creating a server, client and running them at the same time. Well, server went fine. Client as well, and I even managed to make them both work at the same time.

There are however a few hickups. I have a 60Mbps line over here.

• With my client on the router, I've managed up to 25Mbps. (With a server in Holland)
• With the NordVPN app on my PC, I manage to get it up to about 50-55Mbps. It depends.

I know there are some things to look at like ISP throttling, but if the app is so much faster than my client config, I think it's related to something else. And looking at the hardware of the router, it looks to me it's fast enough to do the job, right?

Second, although I've followed the client/server handout on the Wiki, I can't manage to get the server to work, with the client running. From a local address from within the LAN, it can be done, but not from outside. Is there a crucial thing I'm missing, which isn't in the handout?

Third, there might be some things/notes to streamline the whole thing, since some things are not really quite clear to me at the moment, like the client/server thing for instance.

As said earlier, I'm not gonna send lines of logs and configs right away, since this story is long enough already to explain the 'problems'.

I hope to hear from you gents.

~Jacco.

[iplaywithtoys]

@jaccovdzaag

• With my client on the router, I've managed up to 25Mbps. (With a server in Holland)
• With the NordVPN app on my PC, I manage to get it up to about 50-55Mbps. It depends.

I know there are some things to look at like ISP throttling, but if the app is so much faster than my client config, I think it's related to something else. And looking at the hardware of the router, it looks to me it's fast enough to do the job, right?

Right. it is fast enough to do the job. It's just not as fast as your PC. Your PC is fast enough to do the job even faster than the router can.

OpenVPN relies solely on the CPU. It's software crypto, and isn't offloaded to dedicated crypto chips. A more powerful CPU will give a faster OpenVPN tunnel, a less powerful CPU will give a slower OpenVPN tunnel.

@jaccovdzaag

Second, although I've followed the client/server handout on the Wiki, I can't manage to get the server to work, with the client running. From a local address from within the LAN, it can be done, but not from outside. Is there a crucial thing I'm missing, which isn't in the handout?

Possibly. Time to start posting logs and config files.

In addition, what have you tried, tested, seen, and deduced? Anything you can provide will help the forum members to assist you with troubleshooting. On that note, the Wiki page for OpenVPN on OpenWRT has some recommended troubleshooting steps to follow...