[support]

@casino You enter your CleanBrowsing API key on the router and the router will bring your CleanBrowsing profiles to the list of available DNS services. You can choose your CleanBrowsing profile from the dropdown. Without the integration, you’ll have to enter the DNS IP addresses manually by selecting “custom”.

If you enable DNS over HTTPS on the router, then the router will send the DNS queries using your individualized DoH URL for CleanBrowsing. This is more secure and more accurate than the normal DNS queries over UDP, especially when your Internet connection is behind Carrier Grade NAT (CGNAT).

You still need to log on the CleanBrowsing web site to control the filtering categories for each of your profiles.

[support]

Since it’s not possible to determine HTTPS URL paths without decrypting the connection, the router blocks the whole domain.

[support]

You can’t disable the ports for now. But there’s a workaround: assign the ports you want to disable to a VLAN you don’t use (for example, X3). Then, enable the VLAN for a VPN client connection but don’t actually start the VPN connection.

[support]

Yes you can. Name the bands differently gives you more control, but naming them the same is more convenient.

[support]

The v1.20 image is pretty old. Your hardware probably doesn’t have enough space to hold the new firmware image.

[support]

@casino It won’t be in the next update. But we’ll keep this in mind.

[support]

@casino Black/white lists control whether the sites are blocked. When a site is blocked, it’s never available.

Calendars control when a site is available (for sites that are not blocked). When you put google.com on a calendar with no time allocation, it is equivalent to putting google.com on a black list. However, there are some differences:

1. If google.com is in the black list, you can bypass the blocking for subdomains such as news.google.com, mail.google.com by putting them in the white list.
2. If google.com is blocked by a calendar, you need to create a new calendar with open time slots for the subdomains such as news.google.com, mail.google.com.

The page slowdown is a bug. Thanks for bringing it up. It will be fixed in the next update.

[support]

@casino You need to check the logs in Raw view to see the blocked domain names and the block reasons.

Black/white lists and calendar entries are separate from each other. White listing a domain does not make it available for all times. You need to create another calendar with broader time slots for the more specific domains. I.e., you need to create a new calendar for mobile-webview.gmail.com, inbox.google.com, etc., and assign to it the time slots you want those domains available.

[support]

@moral The other way around. Those in Access Control override the Internet Settings page. When Access Control is enabled, the DNS in Internet Settings is used only when you choose “System Default” on a profile.

[support]

Comparing these three ways of ad blocking:

1. hosts file on each computer
2. DNS service such as AdGuard
3. pcWRT router built-in ad blocking

In general, if you do 2 or 3, then you don’t need 1.

With option 2, you just set the DNS server IPs to that of AdGuard. But you don’t have much control over what’s blocked.

With option 3, you need to check the “Ad Block” checkbox on the profile, and the router will apply a default block list (https://github.com/pcwrt-router/Adblock). You can add domains to the white list to bypass the default block list, and you can add domains to the black list to block additional domains (append !A to the domain name to indicate an Ad block instead of a normal block). For example, to block ads.example.com as an Ad domain, you’d enter ads.example.com!A.

With option 3, the router will report the number of ads blocked for the day for the device you are using. And you have the option to pause Ad blocking for the device you are using, with the ad block control page (in case some web site doesn’t work with ads blocked).

[support]

What is the IP address displayed under the Internet section in the Status page (on the pcWRT router)?

[support]

@casino This would be a security issue. We can’t let an unauthenticated user rebooting the router.

[support]

@kmortelite You need to connect the pcWRT WAN port to a LAN port on your main router.

[support]

@ANGEL Open your browser, log on the router management page. Click on the Apps link on the top and you’ll see the Access Control icon on the page.

[support]

@goldie Go to the Access Control page, there’s a “View Logs” link to the right of the page title.

[Author]

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