Hub 6 not connecting to VPN

[smf22]

When you establish a VPN the packet will be different format to normal. In general the packets are either TCP or UDP, but PPTP uses something called GRE (Generic Routing Encapsulation). See VPN Tunneling Protocols for pictures of the packet formats.

My guess would be that something in the firewall doesn't like this packet type and so it simply crashes when one passes through.

I wonder if moving a device temporarily to the DMZ would prove that? Not that it makes a lot of difference as BT don't seem to be listening so won't know what's been proven by the "guinea pigs" with the Smart Hub.

Regards

[RichRolls]

I have the same problem with the HH6 not working with VPN. 

Luckily, I hadn't returned my HH3, so I have reconnected it, as I can't afford to be without my work VPN, as both my wife and I need it for when we work from home. 

Btw, I was also told by BT help that they don't support VPN and then asked if there was anything else they could help with. 

unbelievable poor service. 

[smf22]

@RichRolls @sevenacregreen

If you can stand the pain I would go back to BT and make the point I posted in message 19. The Hub is not supporting a VPN, it is being asked to NAT (Network Address Translate) and route IP traffic of a particular type i.e., GRE in the case of PPTP, and when doing so it crashes.

@NeilO @PaddyB 

In message 5 and message 10 we've had comments that this is being fed back to the hub team. Any response from them yet? Also can we get a statement about the hub "not supporting VPN". As I mention... the hub is not supporting VPN.

Regards

[sevenacregreen]

It easy to loose the will to live with BT support! It takes so long to get to talk to someone that even begins to know what they are talking about then they know not to go off script. The SH 6 is so smart I could not get it to work how I wanted with some of my other kit so I think it will be easier to go out and buy a tp unit. If I have the energy in the morning I will tacle their support again. It is clearly something W10 does differently as W7 does not cause SH6 to miss a beat.
I will try moving a W10 pc to DMZ and post outcome.

Progress - don't talk to me about progress. Marvin!

[DanielS]

Hi @smf22,

It's still with them at the moment. I'll get it chased up and should have a reply back over the next couple of days.

Thanks

DanielS

[stuclark]

I've got exactly the same issue using a HH6 and Windows 10 VPN client to connect to my work systems.

The HH6 reboots as soon as you try to pass some traffic (i.e. do *anything*). The HH5 is stable as a rock (although it had issues in early firmwares)

Im using the HH6 on a PlusNet broadband connection, so can't moan at BT directly; but I work in IT and agree with what people are saying on here - this is definitely a HH6 issue (possibly with the firewall; I haven't tried disabling that entirely yet)

[anotherother]

exactly the same problem here, brand new smart hub -  work lappy on Windows 7 and every time i try to establish a connection it causes the router to lose connection and flash green and orange.

unfortunately i sent back my old HH4 and am now left with connecting to work via iphone.

i know it's a consumer service, but it used to work on the previous non-infinity service, so i had reasonably expected to retain this functionality..

please get this sorted out soon, at the least give us a time scale for a fix or work around!

[sevenacregreen]

Hi @smf22
Tried assigning DMZ to a W10 machine still causes hub reset when connecting VPN through hub.

[Jonkarra]

I doubt your VPN is using GRE as it can't be natted. Most likely it's using Nat traversal ie encapsulating the GRE into UDP packets.

[MonkeyWonders]

Performing a packet snoop, I can see for web traffic over the VPN, the encapsulation is
http/tcp/ip/ptpp/gre/ip/frame layer. So it's using GRE which is what the HUB would be tripping up on.