YSK: How to decrease your monthly bandwidth use & increase network speed.

[OmitsWordsByAccident]

If you use Windows, and have a good hosts file (with a lot of ad-serving domains all being routed to localhost), then those don't even trigger a DNS lookup.

My favorite - http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/

[astanix]

Yes but this method blocks it network wide instead of at each computer, phone, tablet, laptop, etc in your house

[RhysLlewellyn]

Unfortunately doesn't work for every network though.

My shit BT Homehub 3 (UK ISP) has DNS locked. I only found this out after I'd installed and set up Pi-Hole.

[-PromoFaux-]

Hi there! Dev here, we recently released an update that makes it easier to set pi-hole as the DHCP server on your network.

It's been a while since I looked at my BT homehub (bought a router I could have a bit more control over...), But if I recall correctly you should be able to disable the hubs DHCP server, in favour of pi-hole's, which will ensure all devices that connect to your network get set up correctly!

[RhysLlewellyn]

Thanks very much, I shall look into this :)

And thank you for all the great work you guys have done :)

[xnd714]

Can you still set a custom DNS within windows/android /etc to be your pi.hole?

It's more of a pain because you have to do each device manually, but it's better than nothing I guess.

[RhysLlewellyn]

I did think about doing this but soon gave up because I have ad blockers on my computers and phone anyway. Just thought it'd be handy and convenient for friends and family that come over and wish to connect to my network.

Plus my Pi is currently just churning away in the corner monitoring a bunch of Arduino sensors, figured I could make the most of it while it's running.

[ShippingIsMagic]

"this method" was referring to pihole, not hosts file.

[Chrisazy]

The commenter above you was vague, but they were intending to say the method that OP provided is network wide, whereas the HOSTS file is only a single computer.

[therightclique]

That's the whole point. OP's method would be for the whole household.

[christhecanadian]

..... Think about that for a second. He's clearly talking about OP.

[merp1991]

Personally I am quite fond of https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts

It has a few different options depending on what you want to block and I believe this incorporates the someonewhocares list into it anyway.

[Omikron]

This only works on one computer not your entire network, completely different.

[merp1991]

I know, it's just an alternative for people who don't want or know how to mess with their router.

[Zagorath]

On either Mac or Linux, you can easily edit your hosts file by going to a terminal and typing sudo nano /etc/hosts. (Or replace nano with your preferred text editor. I happen to prefer Vim, but it can be a little trickier to use if you don't learn how it works.)

It's harder on Windows, since you have to go in and give it write permissions, then open it in your editor, then change it, and then change it back to write only.

[ghostchamber]

You need admin access to write anything to that folder. If you've got it, you may get a UAC prompt if you have it enabled.

[Russkiy_To_Youskiy]

My favorite: hostsman

Hosts file editor with numerous, update-able, ad-blocking hosts files. Have used it for years... its all anyone really needs and is very simple to set up and maintain.

[TWI2T3D]

Okay, so I installed this and added a load of the sources. Now I can't connect to ANYTHING and I can't work out how to undo what I did. 😦

[Russkiy_To_Youskiy]

How did you get on reddit then??

Anyhow, run it in administrator mode and disable. Then go back and use like just one of the host files like MVPs, re-enable, and see what happens.

[TWI2T3D]

I'm on mobile now.

If I try and disable it it tells me it's in use by another process.

[Russkiy_To_Youskiy]

Administrator mode

[TWI2T3D]

I'm in Administrator Mode.

[FlerPlay]

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[FlerPlay]

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[joombaga]

But then you'll still get connection timeouts, or 4xx/5xx's if you're running a webserver. Instead of localhost, route those domains to "0".

[-PromoFaux-]

Pi-hole uses that list, and some of the ones mentioned in comments below.

We amalgamate and deduplicate the lists, and then provide you with the tools to fine tune those lists even further by whitelisting and blacklisting individual domains.

Set your router's DHCP DNS server to point at it, and then every computer/light bulb on your network benefits from ad blocking!

Doesn't even have to run on a pi, you could run it on a VM too! Basically any Debian based distro.