FreeNAS Web interface stuck on the Shark - network issue?? mobo X9SCL-F NICs Intel Pro 1000

[rappel]

Background
Had a perfectly well running system (albeit not active). Installed at 11.2 updated to 11.3. BUT it was on a consumer motherboard with core i7 and normal memory. Having read loads and then tested new memory for the board to death I decided that the one error in a week was still more than I wanted. So...
I purchased a secondhand supermicro board (X9SCL-F) bought some ECC memory to suit ran memory test for a long while and no issues.

Swapped the new board into the chassis, removed a 4 port intel network card as the new mobo has dual interface, I booted up to see whether the OS would upgrade, loads of errors. No issue I was happy to reinstall.
I reinstalled the OS from 11.2 .iso and all went well - installed, rebooted removing media, console screen came up, network interfaces detected and IP address allocated via DHCP. Changed the IP address and rebooted. All seemed normal again.

Tried to access the web interface, to check data pool imported ok etc and set up anything else I might have kludged, at which point I get the web interface loading, what I assume is the page background displays as a result (the shark on a dark screen), loading messages at the bottom as if more data is coming which then stop eventually but no error message from browser that it couldn't access or load anything. In effect it appears to load the shark logo and freeze.

Tried from different machine, the same, tried different browser on both, the same.
Tried basic network connectivity - can ping into FreeNAS machine and out from the shell.
Tried rebooting FreeNAS. The same
Tried resetting config on the FreeNAS box. The same

Problem in summary
Swapped mobo, memory and processor which test out OK as hardware, reinstalled FreeNAS, all other hardware and disks remain the same bar network card. System seems live but can't connect to web interface.

Searched forums and wider but this doesn't seem to match any of the other web interface doesn't work, which seem to be more around basic network issues.

O n impulse I looked at the browser inspector as I was about to post this. Output in attached file. This may or may not be relevant. I have no idea.

Any help or thoughts gratefully received.

 

[rappel]

OK, played around a bit...
Verified the hardware is OK. It works under Mint. Self configures easily. Networking perfect.

Reloaded FreeNAS a number of times.

Networking is now not OK, i.e. can't ping in or out of the box. Yet the interface is up and is getting a DHCP allocated address. It must be actually allocating and receiving because I've reformatted the boot drive SSD (I even once tried full formatting as NTFS) , so unless something caches a network configuration on the data pool it can't be remembering from one instance to the next. I am no longer getting the shark but occasionally I do get a background image after a long time. Not sure if this is something to do with browser caching or whether it's actually intermittently reaching the webserver simply because it tries many more time than ping does.

I've tried configuring specific addresses in the console and this appears to work but makes no difference to the lack of connectivty.
There are no local firewall devices, only on the exit to the internet and on endpoint boxes if configured, mainly not.
Read through the BSD networking section and stumbled through the firewalls, IPFW is running but allowing everything, which is presumably the default config for FreeNAS. PF doesn't appear to be running. IPF doesn't appear to be installed (well IPFSTAT command not recognised)

Are there any known issues with FreeNAS or FreeBSD with this motherboard (X9SCL-F) or NICs - believe these are Intel Pro 1000, but not really got used to FreeBSD commands around hardware yet. The compatibilty list shows so many of these I can't believe that it's this but...

Again, any thoughts or advice appreciated

 

[sretalla]

Are there any known issues with FreeNAS or FreeBSD with this motherboard (X9SCL-F)

What you're describing isn't likely to be that type of board.

Check the cabling as a starting point.

 

[rappel]

Thanks, but I don't think it's the cabling level. I've done the simple stuff - already plugged and unplugged and tried both ports on the m/b and they both seem to work fine. I can see the connection from the GS105 switch connected at 1000 link speed and the cable test on that box reports cable link OK.
In any case the network worked fine under Linux Mint 19.3 live. In fact the board gives a pretty lively response and the network happily streamed video for 10 minutes from the internet and local. This was with exactly the same hardware config and setup, literally all I did was set the board to boot from USB I didn't touch anything else.

That's why I was wondering about hardware issues or possibly drivers for the NICS but then I don't see why the NICS get the DHCP allocation. It smells of an unusual error or something's blocking traffic.
Unf. I have no experience of freebsd prior to trying FreeNAS and while the documentation is logical and pretty thorough from what I can see, I haven't found a troubleshooting style guide anywhere yet. Most of what's in the networking guide I think I've checked - well I have as best I can.
Ditto NGINX, no clue where to start with that.

One thing I haven't tried yet is unplugging the data pool drives and trying without those but unless there's some weird caching of config on there from the previous mobo install I can't see why they would be causing an issue.

 

[XastrideX]

Hey Rappel,

I ran into a similar issue recently (on 11.3) where the webgui would only show the shark logo and no login options (issue was occuring on all browser on my PC)

Can you access the gui via a mobile device on your wifi? If so you may want to look at you antivirus on your PC(s)


I had bitdefender blocking content on the page
disabled protection and I could access the webgui
added the IP address of my FreeNAS as an exclusion

Hopefully this gives you something else to check

 

[rappel]

Hey Rappel,

I ran into a similar issue recently (on 11.3) where the webgui would only show the shark logo and no login options (issue was occuring on all browser on my PC)

Can you access the gui via a mobile device on your wifi? If so you may want to look at you antivirus on your PC(s)


I had bitdefender blocking content on the page
disabled protection and I could access the webgui
added the IP address of my FreeNAS as an exclusion

Hopefully this gives you something else to check

Thanks, It's a good thought. I use Avast and have before had issues with it on odd sites with it's protection behaviour.
Unfortunately however I am experiencing the same issue on multiple client machines, one android (7) and one linux, neither of which have any firewall or AV up and running. One's Chrome the other Firefox. So... having looked at basic networking and not found anything, I think I need to head for NGINX next see if that can tell me anything with it's connection logs. Just a bit slow when one's learning from ground zero!