Running pfSense Firewall and Router in a Proxmox VM
What is pfSense?
pfSense is a firewall/router computer software distribution based on FreeBSD. The open source pfSense Community Edition (CE) and pfSense Plus is installed on a physical computer or a virtual machine to make a dedicated firewall/router for a network. It can be configured and upgraded through a web-based interface, and requires no knowledge of the underlying FreeBSD system to manage. -https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PfSense
- Download the pfSense AMD64 .iso Download
- Extract the downloaded pfSense .gz
- Log into the ProxMox web UI
- Select a storage from the left navigation pane to upload the .iso to
- Select ISO Images in the left sub-navigation pane
- Upload the pfSense .iso file to the ProxMox ISO image library
- Right click the ProxMox node name > Create VM
- Type pfSense in the name field and set a unique VM ID > Next
- On the OS tab, set the Type field to Linux, Version to 5.x - 2.6 Kernel and select the pfSense .iso in the ISO Image field > Next
- On the System tab, leave the defaults > Next
- On the Hard Disk tab, set the Disk size field to 8 > Next
- On the CPU tab, set Cores field to 2, Type field to Host > Next
- On the Memory tab, set the Memory to 1024 and Uncheck Ballooning Device > Next
- On the Network tab, set the Model field to VirtIO (paravirtualized), Uncheck the Firewall box > Next
- Verify the summary and click Finish
- Click the pfSense VM in the left navigation menu > Select Hardware from the left sub-navigation menu
- Click Add > Network Device
- Set the Model field to VirtIO (paravirtualized), Uncheck the Firewall box > Click Add
- Select Options from the left sub-navigation menu > Double click Use tablet pointer > Uncheck the Enabled box > Click OK
- Right click the pfSense VM in the left navigation pane > Start
- Click console in the left sub-navigation menu
- Press Enter to Boot Multi- user
- Select Install pfSense > Press Enter
- Select the keyboard mapping to use > Press Enter
- Select Auto (UFS) BIOS Guided Disk Setup > Press Enter
- Wait for pfSense to copy files and install
- At the Manual Configuration prompt select No > Press Enter
- Select Reboot > Press Enter
- Navigate back to the Hardware options
- Double click the CD/DVD Drive > Select Do not use any media > Click OK
- Select Shutdown > Reset > Yes to restart the VM
- Click console in the left sub-navigation menu
- Welcome to the pfSense terminal
Configuring Network Interfaces and Web UI
- At the prompt to setup VLANs type n > Press Enter
- Enter a WAN interface name > Press Enter
- Enter a LAN interface name > Press Enter
- When asked Do you want to proceed? type y > Press Enter
- At the pfSense menu, select Set interface(s) IP address by typing 2 and pressing Enter
- If asked to configure DHCP on the WAN interface type n > Press Enter
- Enter a LAN IP address on the same subnet as your LAN
- At the bit count prompt type 24 > Press Enter
- Enter an IPv4 upstream gateway > Press Enter
- At the IPv6 DHCP prompt type n > Press Enter
- Leave the IPv6 address blank and press Enter
- At the DHCP server prompt type n > Press Enter
- At the revert to HTTP prompt type y > Press Enter
- The http address of the pfSense Web UI will be displayed
- Press Enter to return to the main menu
- Open a new browser tab and navigate to the web UI http address
- Log into the web UI with the username admin and password pfsense
- Select System > User Manager from the top navigation
- Click the edit icon across from the admin user
- At the pfSense Welcome screen click Next and Next again
- Enter a hostname, domain and DNS servers for the VM > Click Next
- Set the server timezone > Click Next
- Leave the defaults on the WAN Interface setup > Click Next
- Set and confirm a new password for the admin user
- Click the Reload button
- Enjoy exploring pfSense