Zero Tier frequent disconnection (with wire shark logs)

[egbert]

Hi All,

I am currently using RDP via zerotier to access my laptop at work from my home computer. Since starting, I have frequent disconnection about 1 every 30 minute to an hour.

I have checked both my home computer and laptop at work during the disconnection and the internet has always connected fine (tested by constantly pinging google DNS).

I attached my wireshark log here right when the disconnection occurs. Every time the disconnection occurs, I just need to wait until it reconnect itself.

Can anyone help me with this?

[dajhorn]

Nothing is actionable in this log. Put Wireshark on the physical interface instead.

What does the ZeroTier session between the home computer and the work laptop look like when the disruption happens?

Is zerotier-cli indicating a DIRECT or RELAY connection?

Can you run something else at the same time as ZeroTier and check whether both go down at the same time?

I have checked both my home computer and laptop at work during the disconnection and the internet has always connected fine (tested by constantly pinging google DNS).

Ping is not diagnostic for this issue if your work computer is behind a fancy corporate firewall.

[egbert]

Hi Dajhorn,

when you are saying to put wireshark on the physical interface, are you saying to put it in the wifi?

When it disconnect, RDP will say attempting to reconnect. When I tried to ping the client IP, it will say request time out.

I could not find where the Direct/Relay connection is in the zero tier windows clients.

When it disconnects, I tried to run youtube videos and it works just fine.

[dajhorn]

@egbert

when you are saying to put wireshark on the physical interface, are you saying to put it in the wifi?

Yes.

@egbert

When it disconnect, RDP will say attempting to reconnect. When I tried to ping the client IP, it will say request time out.

Watch the ZeroTier session.

At this point in troubleshooting, the RDP and ICMP traffic is irrelevant until you get ZeroTier working.

@egbert

I could not find where the Direct/Relay connection is in the zero tier windows clients.

Check things like:

# zerotier-cli.bat status
# zerotier-cli.bat peers
# zerotier-cli.bat listpeers

And ask the IT team at your employer if they’re blocking you. A common failure mode is:

1. The corporate firewall initially permits ZeroTier traffic, but flags it and raises an alarm.
2. After a few days or weeks, the network administrator notices the alarm.
3. And they try various things to block ZeroTier, which causes instability.
4. And a few days later ZeroTier stops working altogether.