Hello, opinions on difficulty of VPN setup vs Firewall vs other for first project?

Hello all,

I wanted to say hello, but also to sneak in a VoxPop: What are the relative difficulties of these projects.
For context, I’m a total beginner at linux with limited exposure to the IT industry. I’ve been watching the L1t News for a year or two and have caught the paranoia bug; I dream of Windows running in a VM locked down tighter than a duck’s ass, a smart phone running similarly, and a way of monitoring incoming/outgoing traffic, and lording it over webmaster’s pitiable requests for tracking cookies.
Perhaps what I want is impossible as that horse has bolted; perhaps I just need to start working on it and it comes in time?

On the assumption that if I knew everything you guys did, I’d be able to answer my own questions, what are you fine people’s opinions on the difficulty of each of the projects?

Setting up 2nd PC as a Firewall ( n/10)
Buying and configuring a VPN service ( n/10)
Setting up a custom VPN ( n/10)
Creating a linux machine with a Win10 VM ( n/10)
Setting up an Android/iOS-less smartphone ( n/10)

Thoughts welcome, and thanks for taking a look

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Weighing in from a technical perspective (I know how I’d do these things, but just haven’t) and educated guess work:

  • Linux + windows VM = 2-3/10 … this is well documented and standardized for the most part.

  • Setting up a 2nd PC as a Firewall…So basically a Pi-Hole? = 3-5/10 … should be relatively simple project that has plenty of guides

  • Setting up custom VPN = 5-10/10 … this really depends on scope and complexity, do you want to have it always available to log into from anywhere? Do you plan to setup nodes in the cloud? Etc…This also has good guides and tutorials, but I imagine it’d be real easy getting lost in the weeds.

  • Buying and configuring a VPN service = 1-3/10… depends on the service and how much configuration you need, but basically a simple process. Mullvad is the one I use; they have good documentation and good enough app, I find.

  • Setting up Android = 1-5/10 … Android out of the box is not bad coming from iOS and plenty of the wanted user controls are there out of the box. You also have a wide selection of OS flavors and devices with various levels of user friendliness and security / privacy features, so you can basically just buy what you need. It’s more the flashing GrapheneOS or something that enters more complex territory and even then I hear it’s much better nowadays

Edit:

Network stuff always gives me headaches, so your mileage may very :slight_smile:

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Setting up 2nd PC as a Firewall ( depends how far you want to go, from 2 to 9)
Buying and configuring a VPN service ( 2)
Setting up a custom VPN ( never done it)
Creating a linux machine with a Win10 VM (2-6 depends on how far you want to go also mostly 3-4 tho)
Setting up an Android/iOS-less smartphone ( 1-10 depends on the phone you have)

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Thanks for the replies Fluffy and Converge,

On the VPN side, nothing too fancy, just something where I can mask my actual location and watch US Netflix would be a good start. I’d like to mask my geolocation for sanity reasons - like a PO Box for the internet rather than complete obfuscation, just from home would be fine.

My phone is, for sure, listening to me. I had a conversation with my brother and was telling him about the voice-tracking stuff. To test it, we had a back and forth about luxury cruises and yachts, and wouldn’t you know it, boats featured heavily in our served adverts for the next few days! I have a Ulefone which is close to end of life and am considering a Fairphone as my next.

Anyway, thanks for the input. Gotta hit the hay in the UK

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