OpenWRT for Linksys WRT1900AC

[htismaqe]

Yeah, it totally makes sense that they would be reluctant to support it. And it also makes sense that they might have warranty issues with 3rd party firmware.

But then don't advertise as a feature, right?

 

[thiggins]

Yeah, it totally makes sense that they would be reluctant to support it. And it also makes sense that they might have warranty issues with 3rd party firmware.

But then don't advertise as a feature, right?

Advertising's purpose is solely to make you want to buy a product / service. Reality is always different.

 

[Deleted member 28741]

Totally agree

 

[htismaqe]

Of course.

However, a manufacturer "advertising" a feature that it knows up front would void the warranty could legally be considered fraud, at least in this country...

 

[TonyH]

Hi.
Or Marvell is still working on the driver?

 

[ilukeberry]

Yes it is.. but no ETA.

 

[RMerlin]

Warranty and support may be different. Warranty covers repair/replacement for broken / defective hardware. Support is helping customers with setup and operation.

Agreed. I would not expect technical support for a third party firmware.

And for warranty, how about damage because someone cranks the transmit power, or damages the board when accessing the serial header?

Transmit power can be adjusted just the same with standard firmware. In Asus's case for instance, you can enable telnet, and then manually change it.

Transmit power however is limited by the wireless driver, so a third party firmware cannot damage a router anymore what the manufacturer-provided driver would allow. And honestly, if software can program a radio to emit a higher output than what the hardware really can handle, I'd call that a hardware design flaw. Software should never be able to physically damage hardware in my opinion, otherwise a software bug, or even a malware could destroy hardware.

As for the serial header - this isn't related to third party firmwares. In this case, if you open the case, you do void the warranty, regardless of the firmware. And a serial cable is only needed for development, it's not necessary for flashing a third party firmware.

Buffalo is the only company that I know of that offers factory-blessed DD-WRT based routers. Doesn't look like it helped them gain much market share. But their warranty and support policy could be a model for others.
http://www.buffalo-technology.com/technology/partnered-software/dd-wrt/

To Buffalo's defence, they got hit by a sales ban in the US a few years back, which probably did little to help them gain brand recognition. They are virtually unknown around here.

 

[Raiu]

I openly asked linksys why they didn't even include a vpn server and was told that was "extra". That blew my mind and yes that tells me their firmware is fully matured and will get no extra features.

I'll stick with asus

 

[RogerSC]

I openly asked linksys why they didn't even include a vpn server and was told that was "extra". That blew my mind and yes that tells me their firmware is fully matured and will get no extra features.

I'll stick with asus

Well, if that's the case, they'd better get on the open source wireless driver or they're going to have a lot of unhappy customers! I think that there's a lot people out there expecting more from their $250 wireless router.

 

[chadster766]

The WRT1900AC has dual partitions for the firmware. I think that if it fails to boot a certain number of times, the next boot will automatically be from the second partition. I haven't tested that myself, it was mentionned on the OpenWRT forums or mailing list.

I haven't tried pushing an image over serial, but the bootloader does seem to support a wide range of boot capabilities. Most likely it will also support TFTP, which is fairly common in such devices.

The serial header is on the right side of the pcboard, about two inches inside (if I remember correctly, I opened it a few nights ago and have since closed it). To reach it, you have to remove the four screws at the bottom (inside the feet - thankfully Belkin left holes in the rubber feet so you can easily remove the screws without having to remove the rubber pads). Then, pull the blue front plate forward (if I remember, it was clipped on either sides).

After that, you need to pull the black top cover. This one is your usual clam shell, with clips all around the sides.

Be CAREFUL there! Two of the antennas are on that top half of the shell, with the connectors at the front of the router. If you aren't sure, unplug the two center connections at the front first (make sure to note which goes where). You can plug them back after you have finished unclipping the top cover.

For the serial pinout, Victek posted this handy picture:

http://victek.is-a-geek.com/images/wrtac1900/serial_two.jpg

(that's right - you have to skip that third pin - possibly a CTS or RTS pin).

Serial port settings are 115200 8N1.

RMerlin,

I researched this more and hope I didn't harm my WRT1900AC serial port using RS232, 3 wire communication

Since I'm old school and have done a lot of work over the years with RS232 serial communications I assumed that was also the case with the WRT1900AC serial port.

The WRT1900 runs a new standard I had not heard of before TLL.

Differences between RS232 and TTL is:

1. Lower voltage 3.3 to 5 volts
2. The signal for a high bit is positive voltage (opposite RS232)

A TTL device is needed to connect to the WRT1900AC

 

[sfx2000]

RMerlin,

I researched this more and hope I didn't harm my WRT1900AC serial port using RS232, 3 wire communication

Since I'm old school and have done a lot of work over the years with RS232 serial communications I assumed that was also the case with the WRT1900AC serial port.

The WRT1900 runs a new standard I had not heard of before TLL.

Differences between RS232 and TTL is:

1. Lower voltage 3.3 to 5 volts
2. The signal for a high bit is positive voltage (opposite RS232)

A TTL device is needed to connect to the WRT1900AC

Most FTDI and Prolific based USB to Serial adapters can adjust... don't let that stop you. It's when you're doing straight RS-232 serial, the voltage levels get in the way...

sfx

 

[RMerlin]

RMerlin,

I researched this more and hope I didn't harm my WRT1900AC serial port using RS232, 3 wire communication

Since I'm old school and have done a lot of work over the years with RS232 serial communications I assumed that was also the case with the WRT1900AC serial port.

The WRT1900 runs a new standard I had not heard of before TLL.

Differences between RS232 and TTL is:

1. Lower voltage 3.3 to 5 volts
2. The signal for a high bit is positive voltage (opposite RS232)

A TTL device is needed to connect to the WRT1900AC

The use of TTL levels signalling isn't new, it's been used by embedded devices for years.

You do indeed need a TTL converter. Here's the one I use here (got it from eBay for a few dollars, includes the FTDI chip that interfaces USB to serial):

http://forums.smallnetbuilder.com/showpost.php?p=65838&postcount=7

Photos of a Topless RT-AC66U hooked with the adapter.

 

[chadster766]

The use of TTL levels signalling isn't new, it's been used by embedded devices for years.

You do indeed need a TTL converter. Here's the one I use here (got it from eBay for a few dollars, includes the FTDI chip that interfaces USB to serial):

http://forums.smallnetbuilder.com/showpost.php?p=65838&postcount=7

Photos of a Topless RT-AC66U hooked with the adapter.

I should say new compared to RS232

 

[RMerlin]

I should say new compared to RS232

Well, a lot is new compared to RS-232, which goes back to the 60's

 

[speedingcheetah]

http://www.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=256298&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=150

Reading through those posts, particularly the one by Kong, yea....Open Source for the WRT....is a sham. It is going nowhere fast.

"the problem is the drivers.
They are in a state, that makes it difficult to integrate it into any opensource firmware.
Besides that, these drivers are buggy and the latest revision is only available as closed source binary.

As long as there are only binary drivers you cannot recompile the kernel with different options e.g. network schedulers, so extending the original linksys firmware is also limited.

I guess the fact that linksys now offers their own hacked together openwrt release (with binary driver) on gpl download site pretty much says it all.

They don't expect any opensource firmware support for their unit in the near future.
"

Seems to me, this unit is a flop when it comes to open source support. Still some hold outs, but most have pretty much thrown their hands up and moved on from this model.

 

[soundping]

This router has been blackballed by everybody including linksys.

 

[sfx2000]

Seems like the DD-WRT guys are a bit hurt that Linksys didn't provide a full bootable image for them to hack into...

OpenWRT team - they're making a lot more progress...

https://forum.openwrt.org/viewtopic.php?id=50173&p=13

 

[htismaqe]

Thanks for posting that link. There's some info in there that pertains to another discussion we're having in the other thread.

 

[speedingcheetah]

Thanks for posting that link. There's some info in there that pertains to another discussion we're having in the other thread.

Other thread?

 

[Mordred]

Seems like the DD-WRT guys are a bit hurt that Linksys didn't provide a full bootable image for them to hack into...

OpenWRT team - they're making a lot more progress...

https://forum.openwrt.org/viewtopic.php?id=50173&p=13

LOL. OpenWRT Team??? No one of theses users is a "real" OpenWRT developer.

I only see a few openwrt users, that are working around existing issues in the "hacked together" OpenWRT release by Belkin. No one has provided any patch for the broken shirtty driver, probably because they have no sources and still work with the binary driver.

Progress would be if any of the code makes it to openwrt trunk.

If you want to see, what OpenWRT Dev Team does (exactly nothing when it comes up to the WRT 1900AC) read the mailinglist:

https://lists.openwrt.org/pipermail/openwrt-devel/2014-May/date.html#start

Why do I get the feeling, that you are sponsored by linksys?