Is OpenWRT over x86/AMD64 worth it?

[Hikari]

Hello!

For my router I'm using OpenWRT on Ubiquiti EdgeRouter X.

In last months I've been having issue of its routing crashing. Its bridged LAN ports keep working and I'm able to access its WebUI and SSH, but Internet connectivity goes down. I need to reboot it to get it back.

A few days ago it became worse, even ping was failing and I had to remove its power cord to reboot it. A couple minutes later it crashed again and I had to repeat to get it back.

It also annoys me that I'm unable to backup its full storage partition, all I can do is keep some of its config files under Subversion repo. Because of that I'm afraid of upgrading it and brick on the process.

I've been considering building a PC and move to opnSense or pfSense, but they seem to have worse IPv6 support, I created another thread to ask help on it.

I'm then considering remain on OpenWRT, at least until opnSense support dynamic global prefix + multi-WAN with NPTv6.

Had anybody used OpenWRT on AMD64 hardware on production? Is it better or worse than embedded routers?

 

[sfx2000]

OpenWRT should run fine on x86

 

[Hikari]

I mean, how's its support for drivers, specially motherboard, NIC and USB?

Is it possible to install gcc on it and compile softwares that aren't available on opkg?

 

[sfx2000]

Better to build openwrt on another machine, and then flash the image

 

[Hikari]

Why flash the image? can't it be installed on the SSD?

And why build it instead of using the available bin?

 

[sfx2000]

Why flash the image? can't it be installed on the SSD?

And why build it instead of using the available bin?

OpenWRT is an embedded distribution - not like Ubuntu, Fedora, etc...

Running the image is the best approach, as you mention, and you can use the Imagebuilder/SDK to port in other packages if they're not in the opkg repo.

[OpenWrt Wiki] OpenWrt on x86 hardware (PC / VM / server)

openwrt.org

 

[Hikari]

Ah got it! its installation involves using dd to write the image to HD then resize2fs to resize it!

But then, how do we upgrade it later? Does sysupgrade work? If we dd-write the upgrade too, we'll lose all data on the old partition.

I'm gonna look on the SDK later. First I'm gonna install it on a VM and make some tests. Tnx a lot!

And how is its drivers? Are Intel and Realtek (including onboard) chips supported?

 

[sfx2000]

Sysupgrade works as it should.

Intel and Realtek drivers are there...

Pls note that mwan does work with ipv6, just needs a couple of additional packages (in the opkg repo) and some additional config.

 

[Hikari]

Pls note that mwan does work with ipv6, just needs a couple of additional packages (in the opkg repo) and some additional config.

tnx a lot!

What do u mean about mwan? Could u link some article explaining it?

What I notice in 2 years using it is that it tries to work with IPv6, has support for it, but all devices receive IPv6 addresses from both global prefix, so they choose the route they want, instead of having the router/mwan do it.

 

[sfx2000]

What do u mean about mwan? Could u link some article explaining it?

[OpenWrt Wiki] mwan3 (Multi WAN load balancing/failover)

openwrt.org

 

[Hikari]

wow I didn't know that!! Well, I was considering using NAT6 since NPTv6 isn't supported by OpenWRT, because both my ISP insist on providing /64 prefix. Now with mwan3 devs suggesting it for multi-homing, I'm gonna follow this path.

Anyway, I had decided to test OpenWRT on AMD64... in my vmware network. I created a new vmnet of type host-only. Then I created a new VM and installed OpenWRT on it, added 2 net adapters to it: 1 bridged and 1 on this vmnet, and moved a couple VMs to it. I can confirm with traceroute that they pass thru OpenWRT VM (and OpenWRT EdgeRouterX) to reach Internet. When OpenWRT VM is turned off, Internet is uncreachable!

I'm gonna use snapshots to revert back and make installs and tests on it. I might stop using vmware NAT and use OpenWRT instead to connect my VMs to LAN and internet. I also plan to later install opnSense and make some tests on it.