What is CatWrt?#
CatWrt is an OpenWrt distribution compiled from the open-source Lean LEDE repository. Compared to the official OpenWRT, LEDE has added more plugins that are suitable for Chinese users and is more in line with the operating habits of Chinese users.
CatWrt is directly compiled from the highly acclaimed LEDE source code. It provides a similar experience to QWRT, a private paid version of LEDE for hardware routers, and also provides comprehensive community support and support for various hardware and architectures.
Project address:
GitHub - miaoermua/CatWrt: 🌠 Customized OpenWrt Smart Gateway
Official website: CatWrt.v23.8 Super Performance and Stable Firmware, Supports Multiple Popular mt798x Routers - Miaoer's Blog (miaoer.xyz)
And it's free technical support and updates.
Installing OpenWrt on PVE#
1. Create a virtual machine#
Choose Do not use any media here, select Linux as the guest operating system, and leave the version as default.
Choose the BIOS option according to your preference here (SeaBIOS) or OVMF (UEFI), which will affect the version selected when adding the image later.
If you choose UEFI, do not check Add EFI Disk. For the graphics card, it is recommended to keep it as default or choose Standard VGA for VMware compatibility.
Delete the disk here.
Set the number of CPU cores and keep the category as default or choose according to your situation. To improve performance, select host here and set the CPU weight to improve scheduling aggressiveness -> improve performance.
For memory settings: if you are not running proxy software and only using it for dial-up, set it to 512MB or 768MB. If you need to run proxy software, it is recommended to set it higher, such as 1024. If you need to run containers (docker), it is recommended to set it to 2048 or higher.
Checking the Ballooning device will change the memory to dynamic allocation. If you need to use memory monitoring software (such as htop, pcdn memory detection), it is not recommended to check this option. Some software may experience memory leaks because they cannot determine the memory size.
For network settings: we know that non-(single-arm, pang) routers have two types of interfaces, WAN and LAN.
The first interface of CatWrt is set as the default LAN interface, and the second interface is set as the default WAN interface. Therefore, be cautious here to avoid setting the interface order incorrectly and causing configuration difficulties in the early stage.
After completing the configuration, add the second network port.
Find the device that was just created, click on it, select Hardware, Add -> Network Device -> Select another interface (WAN)
2. Import CatWrt hard disk#
Most OpenWrt x86 versions provide .img format disk images or corresponding packaged compressed files. Here, you need to choose BIOS or EFI according to the corresponding system folder and select the appropriate system.
For example, if I chose OVMF (EFI) earlier, then I should download the EFI image. If I chose SeaBIOS, then I should download the image without EFI.
Download link: Releases · miaoermua/CatWrt (github.com)
Connect to the PVE host using SSH or in the web shell.
Download the image and import it as a virtual disk.
root@pve:~# wget https://github.com/miaoermua/CatWrt/releases/download/v23.8/CatWrt.v23.8.x86_64-squashfs-combined.img
root@pve:~# qm importdisk 104 ./CatWrt.v23.8.x86_64-squashfs-combined.img local-lvm
qm importdisk is the command.
104 is the virtual machine ID.
./CatWrt.v23.8.x86_64-squashfs-combined.img is the image path.
If it was uploaded through the browser, it will be located at /var/lib/vz/template/iso/xxx.img.
local-lvm is the storage location, using local storage.
If the import is successful, it will display "Successfully imported disk as 'unused0:local-lvm'".
Then, follow the steps below to import the disk.
After completion, start the virtual machine.
Connect it to the switch bridged with vmbr0 using an Ethernet cable, and enter 192.168.1.4 in the browser to proceed with subsequent dial-up, DHCP, and other network port information configurations.
Username: root, password: password.
Note:
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*.CatWrt has modified some software packages and configuration compared to LEDE.
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*.Free technical support is provided for basic issues, except for special issues.
This blog is provided by a senior student from Jiangxi University of Science and Technology as part of the CatWrt User Experience Program. Original article: PVE 部署 CatWrt (OpenWrt) | Enjoy your life | AEnjoy’s Blog
This article is synchronized and updated to xLog by Mix Space.
The original link is https://www.miaoer.xyz/posts/network/pve-deplay-openwrt