I Just Got A Raspberry Pi

PiHole, DNS, Oh My!

Raspberry Pi, Linux
May 30, 2020
~2 Min To Read

After wanting one for some time, I finally caved and bought a Raspberry Pi. I got the Pi 4 Model B, the latest and greatest. It boasts the ability to replace your desktop computer, with two micro-HDMI outs as well as on-board wi-fi and 4 USBs. Seeing as a lot of stuff I do needs a lot of processing power, I doubt it will be replacing mine, but I'm excited to see what I can do with it!

Raspberry Pi 4B

PiHole - Block ALL THE ADS.. Sort of..

If you're not familiar, PiHole is a lovely piece of software that can act as a network-wide ad-block for your entire house. Hypothetically super simple to set up: Install Raspberry Pi, Run a Bash Script, Set your router to use your Pi as the DNS server, and you're done.

PiHole Dashboard

For me, it turned out not as simple. I use the stock Router/Modem Combo provided to me by Comcast. Turns out, they don't allow you to set custom DNS servers for the network. Great. So now I have to go around and configure each device manually to use the Pi as it's DNS server to get it to work.

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It's Always DNS.

I've been meaning to buy my own router/modem for a while now, and this might be what finally pushes me over the edge.

What's Next

  • I've got a couple different Twitter bots and such running on different servers that I might try to consolidate to the Pi. I got the 2Gb Memory version so it's not SUPER powerful, but for simple cron tasks and things it could save me some money.
  • Buy a new Modem/Router combo.
  • Buy a set of Raspberry Pi Fans to help deal with the heat. It hovers right around 66°C. with just PiHole running, but I'm sure that will jump up once I start using it for other things.
  • I also had an idea for a lightweight web app that I could host on the Pi and use QR codes to track how often I water my plants. This one's probably way down the line, but could be a cool open source project to work on.

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