Asus TM-AC1900 Question

[Rick Mathes]

I know there has been a lot about converting this router. I have read for 3 days now on different site and am still having no luck. Simple question. This is a new router with the latest firmware and is locked. Can all of these be converted to a regular Asus Ac1900 router if I can figure it out. If so I will keep plugging away. Just don't want to be wasting my time. Thanks in advance.

 

[Rick Mathes]

By the way here is where I am lost. Guides says since I have the latest firmware I need to downgrade firmware with the asus utility. I do put my router in recovery mode and follow the procedure but after 30 seconds it times out. Any suggestions on what I am doing wrong. Tried many times.

 

[joegreat]

By the way here is where I am lost. Guides says since I have the latest firmware I need to downgrade firmware with the asus utility.

Hi,

It's not the latest Asus firmware you need, but the one which does the boot-loader (CFE) update to re-partition the NVRAM for the new(er) firmware. Only after this one you can install the latest Asus firmware.

To avoid the need to search back the right Asus one, you can jump to Merlin's latest good version .55 (.56 has some issues, but will be fixed soon).
Merlin has integrated the CFE update into his actual firmware (Asus not) and this will most likely solve your problem!

With kind regards
Joe

 

[Rick Mathes]

To be sure I understand what your saying can I flash the latest Merlins directly to my tm router without doing anything else. Thanks in advance.

 

[joegreat]

To be sure I understand what your saying can I flash the latest Merlins directly to my tm router without doing anything else. Thanks in advance.

To make it simple: Yes!

 

[Rick Mathes]

To make it simple: Yes!

I am getting the exact same message as before. "firmware upgrade unsuccessfully. It may result from incorrect image or error transmission. Please check the version of firmware and try again" I am trying to flash through browser. This is the tmobile version of the AC68u. So frustrated. Any other advice greatly appreciated.

 

[Rick Mathes]

Seems like my problem may be that I can't enter rescue mode in order to downgrade firmware. It has the latest firmware as its a new router. I hold the wps button for about 15 seconds until the light in the back of the router flashes. When that happens I release the button but I think it just reboots rather than entering rescue mode. Any ideas. About ready to give up and just be happy with tm firmware.

 

[RMerlin]

Seems like my problem may be that I can't enter rescue mode in order to downgrade firmware. It has the latest firmware as its a new router. I hold the wps button for about 15 seconds until the light in the back of the router flashes. When that happens I release the button but I think it just reboots rather than entering rescue mode. Any ideas. About ready to give up and just be happy with tm firmware.

The reset button is used to enter recovery mode, not WPS. However I'm not sure if Asus included recovery mode in the TM-AC1900 bootloader.

 

[Rick Mathes]

The reset button is used to enter recovery mode, not WPS.

I think that has changed since the latest firmware. I hold the reset button forever and never get anything to happen.

 

[RMerlin]

I think that has changed since the latest firmware. I hold the reset button forever and never get anything to happen.

They might have removed the feature, to prevent cross-flashing.

 

[Rick Mathes]

Never mind. I am an idiot. I held the button forever but never saw any lights flash so I assumed it didn't enter rescue mode. It actually does and finally able to enter rescue mode. I feel like a dummy but was expecting to see the power light flash slowly.

 

[Rick Mathes]

Finally got it converted to Merlin. Haven't used linux before so didn't know all the ins and outs. working link a champ.

 

[shimi]

Hi Rick,

I have the same issue as yours can't update firmware, I get a message "firmware upgrade unsuccessful" my TM router firmware is 3.0.0.4.376_2827, how did you flash your router to Merlin version? Thanks in advance.

 

[zgroten]

Hi,

It's not the latest Asus firmware you need, but the one which does the boot-loader (CFE) update to re-partition the NVRAM for the new(er) firmware. Only after this one you can install the latest Asus firmware.

To avoid the need to search back the right Asus one, you can jump to Merlin's latest good version .55 (.56 has some issues, but will be fixed soon).
Merlin has integrated the CFE update into his actual firmware (Asus not) and this will most likely solve your problem!

With kind regards
Joe

I just want to make sure im clear with what you're saying, because all the tutorials I've seen are much more complicated, or they are outdated.

Are you saying that I can take my out of the box TM-AC1900 with firmware "3.0.0.4.376_3108-g23b5852" , put it into recovery mode, and use the Asus Firmware recovery tool to install ASUSWRT-Merlin? No USB stick, etc, required?

 

[Engineer]

I just want to make sure im clear with what you're saying, because all the tutorials I've seen are much more complicated, or they are outdated.

Are you saying that I can take my out of the box TM-AC1900 with firmware "3.0.0.4.376_3108-g23b5852" , put it into recovery mode, and use the Asus Firmware recovery tool to install ASUSWRT-Merlin? No USB stick, etc, required?

See my other post. Will not work. The TMobile firmware/CFE will not accept Merlin's (or Asus) firmware, even in Restoration mode. You're going to have to change the CFE to a native Asus RT-AC68U CFE before another firmware will take. To do that, you'll have to roll back to Tmobile .1703 firmware. There was an HTML hack that would allow telnet to run without downgrading but TMobile/Asus has closed that hole.

 

[Engineer]

They might have removed the feature, to prevent cross-flashing.

s
Partially. You can still get to restoration mode and run the mini CFE webserver to flash a firmware. The normal pattern of restoration mode (flashing power light) has been removed.

 

[zgroten]

See my other post. Will not work. The TMobile firmware/CFE will not accept Merlin's (or Asus) firmware, even in Restoration mode. You're going to have to change the CFE to a native Asus RT-AC68U CFE before another firmware will take. To do that, you'll have to roll back to Tmobile .1703 firmware. There was an HTML hack that would allow telnet to run without downgrading but TMobile/Asus has closed that hole.

The HTML hack still works. I was able to toggle on Telnet.

So, with the Telnet HTML addition toggled on, I wouldn't need to downgrade my firmware.

 

[Engineer]

The HTML hack still works. I was able to toggle on Telnet.

So, with the Telnet HTML addition toggled on, I wouldn't need to downgrade my firmware.

Yes, that should be correct. What CFE and firmware are you running? It was reported the HTML hack was killed off some time ago (I can't confirm as I don't have the firmware).

Of course, you'll still need an Asus CFE to change to non TMobile firmwares.