Connection dropping out qiuckly

cogitans

I've been using PIA for ½ a year. Mostly on Windows 10. But due to some issues in Windows 10 I'm now using Linux Mint 18.3.

I'm using PIA in my quest-OS in VirtualBox. This setup was working regarding Windows 10, too.

But in this setup the connection is going down after 2-3 seconds of connection.

I tried following these guides with no luck:
https://helpdesk.privateinternetaccess.com/hc/en-us/articles/220934827-What-ports-are-used-by-your-VPN-service-
https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/forum/discussion/29139/openvpn-disconnects-after-an-hour

but nothing seems to work out.

I've tried the PIA-manager from the default Linux Mint 18.3 and the downloadable from PIA. No change.
I've tried changing the settings in the connection to a whole lot of different things. But no luck.

This is my current settings:
VPN:
Gateway: nl.privateinternetaccess.com
Type: password
Username: the one that's working
Passwords: the one that's working (after I enter it it dissapears, though...?)
CA certificate: ca.crt
Advanced:
x use custom renegotiationintervals: 0
x use LZO data compression
I tried several numbers in "Use custom gatewayports"
Security: default
Proxies: none

IP4/6:
Automatic

Now what am I supposed to try next?

Thanks in advance :-)

cogitans

Hmm, and if I try to connect now then the icon for the connection just goes round and round in a newer ending loop...

Oh, by the way: in an attempt to solve this issue I did a copy of my working PIA-files from my host-OS to my guest-OS. But that didn't help either.

Max-P

Which setup are you using/want to troubleshoot exactly? There are currently many ways to connect to PIA on Mint which makes it a little tricky to guess which one you're referring to

1. There is the PIA desktop application
2. Mint has a PIA configuration generator iirc
3. There is PIA's on NetworkManager setup script
4. Manual OpenVPN connection on the CLI.

On Mint, I think using our NetworkManager installation script is the easiest/most reliable connection methid.

cogitans

Max-P said:

Which setup are you using/want to troubleshoot exactly? There are currently many ways to connect to PIA on Mint which makes it a little tricky to guess which one you're referring to

1. There is the PIA desktop application
2. Mint has a PIA configuration generator iirc
3. There is PIA's on NetworkManager setup script
4. Manual OpenVPN connection on the CLI.

On Mint, I think using our NetworkManager installation script is the easiest/most reliable connection methid.

Well, I tend to do a little through GUI and the rest through the terminal :-)

I guess the PIA-desktop-application was installed default in Mint 18.3. Right now I'm trying to remove that application so that I'm able to install PIA from scratch through your script-guide. But I don't seem to have any success ion removing that default application either :-/

As I try to install PIA again I get this message:
"Private Internet Access is already running. Please quit it and run the installer again"

And I thought that I already uninstalled PIA...

cogitans

Hmm, this is rather strange.
I just checked that the settings in my connection on my host-OS (which is able to connect) is the same as the settings in my guest-OS (which does not connect).

The only thing I can think of that might cause the internetconnection-icon to just go round and round at every attempt to connect is that PIA has registered all my available MACs (p4226241) ?

Update 1:
Hmm, I'm fetching in the darkness now. But I just succeeded in establishing a connection if I try to connect to The Netherlands and UK - Southampton at the same time. Should this even be a possibility? Did I just discover a bug? Might it be a serious bug as it concerns security and now I'm able to connect to 2 different locations at the same time?

(the only difference in this attempt is that now I was prompted for a password which I don't when connecting to Netherlands. Maybe it's saved somewhere and I have to delete it manually and then retry the connection ?)

Update 2:
hmmm, I'm able to connect to Melbourne and Switzerland, too. The only place I want to connect to (Netherlands) is faulty. I don't know if the settings for the connection has been tampered with but it sure would have been nice to receive information through the application when receiving (supressed) errors about that Netherlands was down earlier today. That would have saved me several hours of work.

Max-P

That is strange indeed!

Netherlands working fine for me and we had no reports of issues with that region. It's not impossible however there was a local issue between you and that region that could have made it inaccessible or perform badly. What error specifically did you find that shows you the region was down?

As for connecting to multiple regions at the time - when using NetworkManager yes you can do that although it's unpredictable which order the stacked VPNs will go, and can lead to performance issues depending on the kind of traffic. But it's not a bug. Our app however only ever connects to one region.

cogitans

Max-P said:

That is strange indeed!

Netherlands working fine for me and we had no reports of issues with that region. It's not impossible however there was a local issue between you and that region that could have made it inaccessible or perform badly. What error specifically did you find that shows you the region was down?

As for connecting to multiple regions at the time - when using NetworkManager yes you can do that although it's unpredictable which order the stacked VPNs will go, and can lead to performance issues depending on the kind of traffic. But it's not a bug. Our app however only ever connects to one region.

Well, the error was that my icon representing an established connection kept on going around and around. Normally it goes around until the connection is established and then it transforms to an icon with 2 sockets and a lock underneath to symbolize a hidden communication-channel. As told this final icon did not emerge but the icon just kept on showing trying to establish the connection.

Glad to hear the program isn't buggy :-)