What is the difference of Asuswrt-Merlin for AC88U, AC-3100 and AC5300

[nmitev]

Dear all,

I recently learned about Asuswrt-Merlin and I must admit that Merlin is doing great job. The provided firmware and Wiki page is really helpful.

I an working as automotive embedded software developer more than 11 years so I am quite familiar with MCUs and embedded firmware development. But I never compiled for routers and has really basic knowledge about them.

Nevertheless using Wiki page and some help I am able to download the source code from GitHub and compile it for RT-AC88U. Then I check (only for limited time) the makefile for ARM based routers (AC88U, AC3100, AC5300) and there is only one possible configuration AC88U. So here is what I would like to ask:

Is there any difference between .trx files for AC88U, AC3100 and AC5300?
Can I flash the generated AC88U.trx file on my AC5300 router and will it work?
If there is difference between the 3 models how to build the .trx file for AC5300?

Thanks in advance for your support.

 

[RMerlin]

Dear all,

I recently learned about Asuswrt-Merlin and I must admit that Merlin is doing great job. The provided firmware and Wiki page is really helpful.

I an working as automotive embedded software developer more than 11 years so I am quite familiar with MCUs and embedded firmware development. But I never compiled for routers and has really basic knowledge about them.

Nevertheless using Wiki page and some help I am able to download the source code from GitHub and compile it for RT-AC88U. Then I check (only for limited time) the makefile for ARM based routers (AC88U, AC3100, AC5300) and there is only one possible configuration AC88U. So here is what I would like to ask:

Is there any difference between .trx files for AC88U, AC3100 and AC5300?
Can I flash the generated AC88U.trx file on my AC5300 router and will it work?
If there is difference between the 3 models how to build the .trx file for AC5300?

Thanks in advance for your support.

The three firmware are different. You must compile for the specific model, i.e.:

make rt-ac88u
make rt-ac3100
or
make rt-ac5300

 

[nmitev]

Thanks! Works perfect!

I prepared for myself a small guide how to compile the source code on newly installed Ubuntu 16.04 LTS 64-bit. The guide is tested at least 2 times and I confirm that it works.
In case someone founds is useful, here it is:


Build Asuswrt-Merlin for RT-AC5300 on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS x64
1. Install Ubuntu 16.04 LTS x64
2. Update Ubuntu
3. All below commands should be executed as superuser “root” ( sudo su and enter password)
4. Install needed packages to build Asuswrt-Merlin:
apt-get install git autoconf automake bash bison bzip2 diffutils file flex \
m4 g++ gawk groff-base libncurses-dev libtool libslang2 make patch perl \
pkg-config shtool subversion tar texinfo zlib1g zlib1g-dev git-core gettext \
libexpat1-dev libssl-dev cvs gperf unzip python libxml-parser-perl gcc-multilib \
gconf-editor libxml2-dev g++-4.7 g++-multilib gitk libncurses5 mtd-utils \
libncurses5-dev libstdc++6-4.7-dev libvorbis-dev g++-4.7-multilib git autopoint \
autogen sed build-essential intltool libelf1:i386 libglib2.0-dev
5. Install 32-bit libraries needed for 64-bit Ubuntu:
apt-get install lib32z1-dev lib32stdc++6
apt-get install libproxy-dev
6. Download source code in “/root” folder – this downloads master branch
cd /root
git clone https://github.com/RMerl/asuswrt-merlin.git
7. List all available tags and choose official build tag (build version)
cd asuswrt-merlin/
git tag -l
git checkout 380.63_2
8. Create directories and hyper-links used by build process
ln -s ~/asuswrt-merlin/tools/brcm /opt/brcm
ln -s ~/asuswrt-merlin/release/src-rt-6.x.4708/toolchains/hndtools-arm-linux-2.6.36-uclibc-4.5.3 /opt/brcm-arm
export PATH=$PATH:/opt/brcm/hndtools-mipsel-linux/bin:/opt/brcm/hndtools-mipsel-uclibc/bin:/opt/brcm-arm/bin
sudo mkdir -p /media/ASUSWRT/
sudo ln -s ~/asuswrt-merlin /media/ASUSWRT/asuswrt-merlin
9. Replace some Ubuntu missing files (needed for build)
cp /usr/include/proxy.h ~/asuswrt-merlin/release/src/router/neon/
cd ~/asuswrt-merlin/release/src/router/libdaemon
aclocal
cd ~/asuswrt-merlin/release/src/router/libxml2
sed -i s/AM_C_PROTOTYPES/#AM_C_PROTOTYPES/g ~/asuswrt-merlin/release/src/router/libxml2/configure.in
aclocal
10.Build RT-5300AC firmware
cd ~/asuswrt-merlin/release/src-rt-7.14.114.x/src/
make rt-ac5300