Proton VPN on Linux looks very different from Windows. How do you select one of their P2P options for faster torrenting?

Pretty much what the title says. I noticed that ProtonVPN Linux has an EXTREMELY limited interface compared to their program on Windows. I also do not appear to have the option to bind qBittorrent to ProtonVPN the same way that I did with MullvadVPN. Has anybody experienced ProtonVPN on Linux and successfully used it for torrenting? It’s nowhere near as simple as on Windows, from the looks of it.

BillionsMustSeed ,
@BillionsMustSeed@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Hey, I’ve been torrenting on Linux through the ProtonVPN program without issues for the past months.

I don’t know the specifics because I’m new to Linux, but I followed the official guide on how to set it up and everything just worked. Don’t even need to change the port in qBit, I can upload anyway as long as I pick a P2P server in Proton, and very fast too (depending of what people want me to seed), uncapped upload speed often nears my max upload bandwidth.

Also binding qBit to the VPN is not a problem, just follow the official guide. Tested it now, and if I disconnect the VPN, qBit shows a red world in the network status and speeds go to zero, so it works.

It’s true that the Linux client is not as fully-fledged as the Windows one, but it’s not unusable.

I’m on PoP!_OS if it can be of any help. If you have questions that might help you with using Proton on Linux feel free to ask and I’ll try my best!

Elarionus OP ,

I just tested it out to see if it would stop if I closed the VPN...it did not stop at all, just kept on downloading. There must be something I'm doing wrong. I'm on Ubuntu, which should function pretty similarly to PoP!_OS. I specifically picked a P2P server in Proton VPN, a United Kingdom one with the little arrow circle symbol.

BillionsMustSeed ,
@BillionsMustSeed@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

You must have made a mistake somewhere, as once I close the Proton VPN client (actual "close", as in the app is not running anymore) my qBit does stop downloading (just tested), although the rest of the system still has access to the network (must have something to do with how apps are installed on Linux, I guess).

In my qBit settings > advanced > network interface I read "tun0", and that's what I think was suggested in the official setup guide on Proton. What do you have?

CalicoJack ,

I’ve had a lot more luck running it in Docker with gluetun, along with qbittorrent in Docker. That way you can bind the whole qbit container to the VPN, which is basically bulletproof. All config options are available as Docker commands, you just need to use Proton’s website to check the server list and pick your favorite p2p-enabled server.

It does take a little fiddling, but it’s solid once you get it running. Port forwarding works too, once you figure out how to enable it.

anarchoilluminati ,
@anarchoilluminati@hexbear.net avatar

God, I hate the Linux app.

ShroOmeric ,

I solved all my problems with ProtonVPN on Linux with Mullvad. Fuck them if they don’t care about linux.

Gutless2615 ,

All well and good but mullvad demonstrated they don’t give a fuck when they took away port forwarding

ShroOmeric ,

I don’t know what to do with port forwarding if I can’t even start my app.

Gutless2615 ,

The config is on protonvpns website user page

ShroOmeric ,

No shit? Big news. Thank god you shared this piece of info. I had no idea.

Gutless2615 ,

App works fine on my side, panel extension and all. Sounds like a PEBKAC problem

ShroOmeric ,

Oh well, if it works on YOUR side that’s it. Problem solved. Next time it’s the first thing I’ll tell to the support. I’ll just show this message and all will be solved. Mate you made my day eh…

Gutless2615 ,

Try googling PEBKAC.

dustojnikhummer ,

And is their Wireguard still limited to 5?

Gutless2615 ,

Yeah but honestly for the price that didn’t bother me. Dropping port forwarding though was a huge pita and forced me to change providers.

juli ,

There’s a guide for it protonvpn.com/…/port-forwarding-manual-setup/ it works ok

praise_idleness ,

I recommend you just use gluetun. Way less of a hassle.

zaknenou ,
@zaknenou@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Thanks for sharing this

lemmie689 ,
@lemmie689@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

I use it on my Linux laptop, there’s no port forwarding, dowloading works fine though, sometimes connects to peers to upload. I have dual boot so I have seen the Windows version, it’s much more sophisticated. I’ve checked for DNS leaks using one of the sites listed in another comment, no leaks.

archpaladin1 ,
@archpaladin1@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

As an FYI to readers, port forwarding with ProtonVPN on Linux can be done, just with a little extra effort.

subtext ,

Yep, and if you’re using docker, gluetun can make it fairly easy to set up portforwarding, then you can call the API from the qbit container to update the port forwarded setting.

Elarionus OP ,

Yeah, the only scary moment I’ve had was when the laptop decided to suspend itself, and when I turned it back on, Linux had disabled all networking systems outside of the default, but immediately started up qBit for some reason, so that was great.

I figured the further I got from Windows, the easier all of this would become, given the community’s tendency towards things like Linux, privacy, etc. It’s only gotten painfully more difficult and contains a lot more gatekeeping. As I’ve asked for help with things like this, especially on the newer versions of Mint and Ubuntu, I just get insulted, even though the old solutions no longer seem to apply.

subtext ,

I don’t have a great answer for you, but hopefully I can provide some ideas that I hope can get your ideas flowing

  1. Use a config file and use the built-in VPN configuration. Not very flexible, but you can be pretty confident it should work.
  2. Use some containers (with docker or podman) to set up a qbit and a gluetun container.
  3. Use the new version of the app for linux if you’re not already.

Whatever you do, I hope you look into the option in advanced settings in qbit to a specific network interface so it only works through the VPN. Unfortunately you definitely right that the Linux app is a second class citizen :/

lemmie689 ,
@lemmie689@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

I get that too, it can be difficult to get help. I try to ignore it and have been using Linux for about 15 years as an OS. I use Kubuntu on my laptop, but I’ve used Mint also. I’m thinking of changing back but it’s so much work, and there are a lot of other options I’d like to try.

I’ve had my network locked out as well, the first iteration of ProtonVPN I used would lock it out if you didn’t close the app before shutting down. I contacted Proton and they sent me the commands to unlock it, so I have them handy in a file. That problem was fixed, afaik, because I can shut down without exiting the app now. I haven’t had my comp suspend, Linux used to have a problem with suspend so I’ve stayed away from it. I haven’t had any problems with Proton otherwise, I used it on my Android as well, I have a paid plan.

vexikron ,
@vexikron@lemmy.zip avatar

DO NOT USE IPV6

Seriously, figure out how to configure it to NEVER use IPv6, make it so it doesnt default fail back from IPv4 to IPv6 for whatever reason!

ISPs are generally still able to serve cease and desist notices if you torrent via IPv6, it usually DNS leaks all over the place.

Use both of these sites to test and make sure your VPN configuration will not leak.

ipleak.net

dnsleaktest.com

Elarionus OP ,

I know very little about networking unfortunately…I do not even think my ISP offers IPV6, but I could just be completely wrong. I went to both of those sites, and it showed me as across the world, where I had selected with ProtonVPN. There were no settings in there at all to change anything. ProtonVPN on Linux is literally just a box with a list of countries that you click on. So much weaker than Mullvad and ProtonVPN on Windows.

vexikron , (edited )
@vexikron@lemmy.zip avatar

Uh ok… well if you had ProtonVPN on, selected an endpoint and both those websites showed that your IP is indicated as coming from the selected endpoint, in another country, that is good!

Unfortunately that doesnt tell us all that you would need to know though.

I have to go to sleep, but if you would like send me a screenshot of what both those sites say when ProtonVPN is on, I could probably tell you if you are good to go, or if you need to dive into ProtonVPN settings.

God help us both if the problem isnt the ProtonVPN config and somehow something with your linux config is fucky, lol.

EDIT: I mean pm me the screenshot, not post them here lol.

Also… yeah I used to use ProtonVPN, switched to linux and dear fucking god the non CLI version was so buggy and broken I switched to i think another VPN provider that actually had a working GUI on a debian based linux build, then to a different one that was CLI only, then more or less gave up amd went with Mozilla because at least the fucking GUI worked.

WarmApplePieShrek ,

The problem: your IPv6 might not go through the VPN.

If you have IPv6, you’re running two completely separate networks, one IPv4 and one IPv6. And a bad VPN won’t block or VPN the IPv6 network.

ProtonVPN doesn’t do IPv6 but they’re working on it.

Phoeniqz ,
@Phoeniqz@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

It seems like the linux app is just an afterthought for ProtonVPN. It takes an ungodly amount of time to start up and I often get errors when I forgot to disconnect it before the last restart of my system. Thus I only use the CLI. It is much better and is very transparent about which servers are for P2P and which are not.

ultranaut ,

They are supposed to be working on a complete rewrite of the Linux client that’s coming out soon.

Platform27 ,

The rewrite is done.

protonvpn.com/blog/vpn-linux-app/

SecurityPro ,
@SecurityPro@lemmy.ml avatar

Yes, but it still doesn’t have wireguard, only openVPN.

SandbagTiara2816 ,

True, but WireGuard is on their roadmap of features in the works

Elarionus OP ,

That’s unfortunate. I’ll end up sticking to Mullvad for now then. I am comfortable with the terminal for navigation and simple things like that, but nowhere near comfortable enough to stake the security of my computer or the wrath of my ISP on it.

Squizzy ,

I was close to moving everything to Proton but the apps were a little weak and they didn’t facilitate importing calendars and such. Wanted me to use my browser extensions because the app and client didn’t support moving to proton

luthis ,
@luthis@lemmy.nz avatar

Something recently broke the client and now it says invalid credentials all the time. I gave up with the client and just downloaded the openvpn files and use those.

Torrenting works…

Sign up to my onlyfans and I’ll hack together a nice Linux client for ProtonVPN and Drive.

HeckGazer ,

Interesting, I’ve only ever used the ovpn files and they recently broke the same way you describe. Redownloaded them and it started working again with the same credentials.

I’m guessing they broke something servers idea and the client had a hard time refreshing its config

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