It took 48 hours, but the mystery of the mass Asus router outage is solved

[sfx2000]

Much like how HP bricked a bunch of printers earlier this week with a firmware update to enforce their DRM and subscription services...

 

[RMerlin]

Much like how HP bricked a bunch of printers earlier this week with a firmware update to enforce their DRM and subscription services...

HP have become real scam lately. The amount of information sharing requests you must deny while installing a new printer is mind boggling. Been through it for two or three customers these past few months, and it was as bad as if I was trying to install a freeware bundled with Bonzo Buddy, Ask toolbar and what not.

 

[Tech9]

Dunno, depends on when asd was implemented.

I'm going to try accessing the file system over SSH tomorrow and see what's happening.

another vendor perhaps?

This needs time. Folks have no Internet now and I'm trying to help remotely with whatever access I have.

 

[RMerlin]

I'm going to try accessing the file system over SSH tomorrow and see what's happening.

A manual power cycle might be needed before you can flash the latest Asuswrt-Merlin (388.11) or stock (386_51xxx).

 

[Tech9]

The ones I need to deal with tomorrow are the Qualcomm with 382 firmware. What needs to be removed if it allows deleting a file? I've read something about /jffs/asd/* but it's 11.30pm already and I can't find it. A person there will give me TeamViewer access to a PC. We can reboot, enable SSH before they lock up again and then? I'm in doubt I can use WinSCP. Anything we can do in SSH?

 

[RMerlin]

The ones I need to deal with tomorrow are the Qualcomm with 382 firmware. What needs to be removed if it allows deleting a file? I've read something about /jffs/asd/* but it's 11.30pm already and I can't find it. A person there will give me TeamViewer access to a PC. We can reboot, enable SSH before they lock up again and then? I'm in doubt I can use WinSCP. Anything we can do in SSH?

The fixed signature should have been downloaded by now, or else it will be downloaded following a reboot.

 

[bennor]

Anything we can do in SSH?

If you can SSH into the router try the following, if you haven't done so already, to see what's listed in the ASD directory:

cd /jffs/asd
ls -l

That should give you a listing of the ASD directory and it's contents (if any) and the file date(s). From there look for the "chknvramxxxxxxxxxx" file (ex: "chknvram20230516"). Check the file date to see if its from last week. Some were removing that file (ex: rm chknvram20230516 or rm /jffs/asd/chknvram20230516) and rebooting their routers to fix the Asus bug from last week. After reboot supposedly the router will pull down a new version of the "chknvram" file from Asus.

Edit to add: Some other suggestions if the router is sluggish or unresponsive. If the router has a USB hard drive attached and is being used as a file repository, check RAM usage through the GUI. If RAM is maxed out (or closed to maxed out) try issuing the following command via SSH to see if it drops the RAM value.

sync && echo 3 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches

If using a RT-AC68U check the NVRAM usage to see how much free space there is. Could be the low NVRAM issue has crept in/up and impacting the router. To view NVRAM usage via SSH try the following, the NVRAM usage is indicated by the "size" output.

nvram show | awk '{print length(), $0 | "sort -n -r"}' | cut -d"=" -f 1 | head -n 20

One can temporarily clear up some NVRAM space by issuing the following command via SSH. Note this doesn't survive reboot.

for line in `nvram show | grep ^[^=]*=$ `; do var=${line%*=}; nvram unset $var; done; nvram commit

 

[Smokey613]

HP have become real scam lately. The amount of information sharing requests you must deny while installing a new printer is mind boggling. Been through it for two or three customers these past few months, and it was as bad as if I was trying to install a freeware bundled with Bonzo Buddy, Ask toolbar and what not.

I noticed this with my recent install of two new HP printers for our home. This behaivor is becomimg the norm.

 

[RMerlin]

This behaivor is becomimg the norm.

Only with HP, AFAIK. I installed Brother and Canon printers these past few months as well, none of them involving data sharing requests (beyond the typical "Register your product" form that is easily skipped).

 

[dlandiss]

Only with HP, AFAIK. I installed Brother and Canon printers these past few months as well, none of them involving data sharing requests (beyond the typical "Register your product" form that is easily skipped).

Roger that. I have a Canon color inkjet and a Brother monochrome laserjet nad they do do whatever I ask of them. No malarkey!

 

[Paliv]

Only with HP, AFAIK. I installed Brother and Canon printers these past few months as well, none of them involving data sharing requests (beyond the typical "Register your product" form that is easily skipped).

We are ready to replace our HP printer for this reason. I hate having to login to use their app. It’s ridiculous.

 

[tdi200]

I'm a bit confused on whether the modem you were using that you wanted to replace was an MB8600 or one provided by Comcast. But if it was\is an MB8600 have you been happy with the way it performs on Comcast?

oh i meant i wanted to remove the modem provided by comcast (thought that might be faulty) and wanted to replace it with MB8600 that i had found from facebook market place but i did not buy the mb8600 because turns out it was an asus issue

 

[Tech9]

"chknvram20230516"

Bingo! We have 4x APs up and running again.

Exactly the same file, CPU on 100% and RAM on 99%. Qualcomm hardware on 382 firmware. The owner there was rebooting the system periodically and I was doing the surgery fast one AP at a time because the routers have only 64MB RAM with 15MB available after boot and lock up quite fast. Once locked they have no chance to update themselves online and even scheduled reboot wasn't working.

Thank you, @bennor.

 

[tdi200]

forgot to mention the merlin firmware is still giving me issue here but oem stock firmware (FW_RT_AC5300_300438648377) working fine on ac5300

 

[sfx2000]

Only with HP, AFAIK. I installed Brother and Canon printers these past few months as well, none of them involving data sharing requests (beyond the typical "Register your product" form that is easily skipped).

As discussed in other threads - there are so many reasons why Brother is a great choice for printers...

 

[tdi200]

Bingo! We have 4x APs up and running again.

Exactly the same file, CPU on 100% and RAM on 99%. Qualcomm hardware on 382 firmware. The owner there was rebooting the system periodically and I was doing the surgery fast one AP at a time because the routers have only 64MB RAM with 15MB available after boot and lock up quite fast. Once locked they have no chance to update themselves online and even scheduled reboot wasn't working.

Thank you, @bennor.

abit new here with ssh and stuff seen comment on reddit i believe thats what u you did? currently on stoke firmware with no issue but when i install back the merlin version the issue is stil there and i just found how to delete so will try to do that later on

1. Turn Telnet on your router then telnet onto it (via putty etc)
2. Once logged in type cd /jffs/asd
3. Type ls (This will show you all the folders)
4. Type cd /jffs/asd

Now look for the file most likely chknvram20230516 or possibly another name 5. Type rm chknvram20230516 -r 6. Type ls (You will now see the folder is gone) 7. Reboot the router and go thru Step 1,2,3 again
You should see a new folder in its place for chknvram ie. chknvram20230518

This seems to be a popular fix mentioned by many, To see how much storage stace the /jffs folder is creating you can also use command df -h /jffs

 

[TexasFlood]

As discussed in other threads - there are so many reasons why Brother is a great choice for printers...

I've been using brother printers for years, decades actually, and been happy with them.

 

[wouterv]

Also "asd" glitches reported for the RT-AC68U, see here and the post after:

Release - ASUS RT-AC68U Firmware version 3.0.0.4.386.51665

I can confirm that if you turn off AI Protection, memory utilization drops to 41%. When AI Protection is On, it's about 67%. This appears to be normal behavior. I have not observed a memory leak as the percentage has not changed very much over the last week.

www.snbforums.com

 

[tdi200]

@RMerlin just wanted to bring you this to an attention that being the owner of AC-5300 when ssh into router i seen this "chknvram2021083002" while on merlin firmware so i went ahead flashed the oem firmware and ssh into it again and seen the "chknvram20230518" so i went ahead reset the router and than flashed back the latest merlin firmware upon checking via ssh i see "chknvram2021083002" but everything is working. as prior to reset i could not access internet

 

[RMerlin]

@RMerlin just wanted to bring you this to an attention that being the owner of AC-5300 when ssh into router i seen this "chknvram2021083002" while on merlin firmware so i went ahead flashed the oem firmware and ssh into it again and seen the "chknvram20230518" so i went ahead reset the router and than flashed back the latest merlin firmware upon checking via ssh i see "chknvram2021083002" but everything is working. as prior to reset i could not access internet

This is perfectly normal. Asus pushes a different signature for Asuswrt-Merlin devices.