[SOLVED] Intermittent Connectivity Problem to VMs and LXC Containers

[bryan3301]

I have two (2) Proxmox hosts. Each host is connected to my network (172.20.73.0) via a wireless NIC and I am using NAT and MASQUERADE. This has been working fine for months. I used an Orbi mesh wireless network. On each Proxmox host, I have a vSwitch; one host as 172.16.77.0 and the other host as 192.168.77.0.

The past week, I have noticed that connections to containers and VMs fail. I can be in via SSH or RDP for hours while at other times, the connection freezes after seconds or minutes. Most times I can reconnect immediately, while other times, I must wait minutes or hours, or, reboot the Proxmox host.

The containers and virtual machines can communicate with one another, as well as, externally to my 172.20.73.0 network and the Internet.

I included a trace route from my laptop at the end of this message.

I am puzzled and looking for ideas and suggestions on how to address this. Your help and feedback is much appreciated. Thank you!!

PS C:\Users\admin> tracert 172.16.77.2

Tracing route to 172.16.77.2 over a maximum of 30 hops

  1     3 ms     3 ms     4 ms  router.lab.local [172.20.73.1]
  2     9 ms     5 ms     7 ms  proxmox1.lab.local [172.20.73.11]
  3   248 ms   215 ms   432 ms  172.16.77.2

Trace complete.
PS C:\Users\admin> tracert 172.16.77.25

Tracing route to 172.16.77.25 over a maximum of 30 hops

  1     5 ms     4 ms     3 ms  router.lab.local [172.20.73.1]
  2    46 ms     6 ms    23 ms  proxmox1.lab.local [172.20.73.11]
  3    63 ms     8 ms     6 ms  172.16.77.25

Trace complete.
PS C:\Users\admin> tracert 172.16.77.25

Tracing route to 172.16.77.25 over a maximum of 30 hops

  1     5 ms     3 ms     3 ms  router.lab.local [172.20.73.1]
  2   218 ms    23 ms     8 ms  proxmox1.lab.local [172.20.73.11]
  3   459 ms     8 ms    67 ms  172.16.77.25

Trace complete.
PS C:\Users\admin> tracert 172.16.77.2

Tracing route to 172.16.77.2 over a maximum of 30 hops

  1     5 ms     4 ms     3 ms  router.lab.local [172.20.73.1]
  2    36 ms     7 ms     6 ms  proxmox1.lab.local [172.20.73.11]
  3   179 ms     6 ms     5 ms  172.16.77.2

 

[bryan3301]

For now, I switched the Proxmox hosts to physical Ethernet connectivity. I am suspecting this may be an issue with the Orbi mesh. It worked fine on the old Orbi mesh; however, I am wondering now if there is weirdness when my client is connected to a WiFI 6E connection and the Proxmox host is connected to a WiFi 6 connection. Even though these are the same network, same IPs, etc., I am wondering if Orbi is messing it up.

I'll let it run this way for awhile and see what happens.

 

[bryan3301]

Well, that did not take care of it. Looking for suggesions.

 

[bryan3301]

I believe the problem lies with the Orbi mesh network. I upgraded to a RBRE960 system (from an older RBR50 which I had no problems with). I turned off my two satellites this morning and only connected my laptop to WiFi via the router. No connection drops. I am pushing Netgear to investigate. I am guessing there is a problem with the backhaul WiFI; however, I will test connecting individually to each satellite to see if there is maybe a hardware issue with one of them.

 

[bryan3301]

I am closing this topic. The root of the problem is a bug with SSH and RDP on the Orbi mesh WiFi (RBRE960). A fix is in the works; however, there is no current ETA. I have switched an ASUS ZenWiFi Pro XT12 msh wifi system. The ASUS system is working flawlessly and is much, much more feature rich; I highly recommend it.

I spend days troubleshooting this problem; I gathered packet captures, debug logs, and thoroughly documented all of my troubleshooting steps. I do commend Netgear for using this information, taking the problem seriously, and owning up to a bug. I would still consider Netgear products in the future given my support experience.