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
  1. Download the pfSense AMD64 .iso Download
  2. Extract the downloaded pfSense .gz
  3. Log into the ProxMox web UI
  4. Select a storage from the left navigation pane to upload the .iso to
  5. Select ISO Images in the left sub-navigation pane
  6. Upload the pfSense .iso file to the ProxMox ISO image library
  7. Right click the ProxMox node name > Create VM
  8. Type pfSense in the name field and set a unique VM ID > Next
  9. 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
  10. On the System tab, leave the defaults > Next
  11. On the Hard Disk tab, set the Disk size field to 8 > Next
  12. On the CPU tab, set Cores field to 2, Type field to Host > Next
  13. On the Memory tab, set the Memory to 1024 and Uncheck Ballooning Device > Next
  14. On the Network tab, set the Model field to VirtIO (paravirtualized), Uncheck the Firewall box > Next
  15. Verify the summary and click Finish
  16. Click the pfSense VM in the left navigation menu > Select Hardware from the left sub-navigation menu
  17. Click Add > Network Device
  18. Set the Model field to VirtIO (paravirtualized), Uncheck the Firewall box > Click Add
  19. Select Options from the left sub-navigation menu > Double click Use tablet pointer > Uncheck the Enabled box > Click OK
  20. Right click the pfSense VM in the left navigation pane > Start
  21. Click console in the left sub-navigation menu
  22. Press Enter to Boot Multi- user
  23. Select Install pfSense > Press Enter
  24. Select the keyboard mapping to use > Press Enter
  25. Select Auto (UFS) BIOS Guided Disk Setup > Press Enter
  26. Wait for pfSense to copy files and install
  27. At the Manual Configuration prompt select No > Press Enter
  28. Select Reboot > Press Enter
  29. Navigate back to the Hardware options
  30. Double click the CD/DVD Drive > Select Do not use any media > Click OK
  31. Select Shutdown > Reset > Yes to restart the VM
  32. Click console in the left sub-navigation menu
  33. Welcome to the pfSense terminal

Configuring Network Interfaces and Web UI

  1. At the prompt to setup VLANs type n > Press Enter
  2. Enter a WAN interface name > Press Enter
  3. Enter a LAN interface name > Press Enter
  4. When asked Do you want to proceed? type y > Press Enter
  5. At the pfSense menu, select Set interface(s) IP address by typing 2 and pressing Enter
  6. If asked to configure DHCP on the WAN interface type n > Press Enter
  7. Enter a LAN IP address on the same subnet as your LAN
  8. At the bit count prompt type 24 > Press Enter
  9. Enter an IPv4 upstream gateway > Press Enter
  10. At the IPv6 DHCP prompt type n > Press Enter
  11. Leave the IPv6 address blank and press Enter
  12. At the DHCP server prompt type n > Press Enter
  13. At the revert to HTTP prompt type y > Press Enter
  14. The http address of the pfSense Web UI will be displayed
  15. Press Enter to return to the main menu
  16. Open a new browser tab and navigate to the web UI http address
  17. Log into the web UI with the username admin and password pfsense
  18. Select System > User Manager from the top navigation
  19. Click the edit icon across from the admin user
  20. At the pfSense Welcome screen click Next and Next again
  21. Enter a hostname, domain and DNS servers for the VM > Click Next
  22. Set the server timezone > Click Next
  23. Leave the defaults on the WAN Interface setup > Click Next
  24. Set and confirm a new password for the admin user
  25. Click the Reload button
  26. Enjoy exploring pfSense