Hope this helps somebody out there ! I almost gave up but there IS a way.
You don't need the cable or anymore than simply telnet (if available), please note via GUI it will work but it's a bit more complicated.
Before moving on, a test that will write OUT the current CFE:
dd if=/dev/mtdblock/0 of=/tmp/BROKEN_cfe8500.bin
(this will export to /tmp/BROKEN_cfe8500.bin the current CFE boot)
Now confirm you have the same sizes of the two bin files (just in case):
ls -lisa /tmp/*.bin
Files must have the same size, if you see zeroes, ABORT!
root@DD-WRT:/tmp# ls -lisa *.bin
26509 516 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 524288 Jan 1 1970 BROKEN_cfe8500.bin
42094 512 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 524288 Jul 3 23:20 cfe8500.bin
and now the MAGIC!
Command in bold will WRITE the GOOD cfe8500.bin boot in the router:
root@DD-WRT:/tmp# dd if=/tmp/cfe8500.bin of=/dev/mtdblock/0
1024+0 records in
1024+0 records out
root@DD-WRT:/tmp#erase nvram
Flash is NAND
erase[1572864]
root@DD-WRT:/tmp# reboot
root@DD-WRT:/tmp# Connection closed by foreign host.
Your router will NOW keep the settings after reboots!!!
Took a while to get proper WIFI speeds with this firmware.
It doesn't look friendly at all with Wifi , still need to figure out if connected devices do switch channels.
Checking here I didn't find much help with this so, here's some if you are having trouble with your R8500:
Getting speeds of 500 Mbps over wifi with an iPhone XS
Tested myself after nvram reset, then applied this config, wifi working perfect.
It's not perfect for anyone but is a great start, wasted all yesterday figuring out how the hell to configure this. Missing the Smart Rule quick setup and band switching settings from Merlin.
Moderator edit: Broke up original image into 3 separate images since you can have 3 attachments per post per forum software config. Had the OP listened to both myself and another moderator, the attached images wouldn't look so blurry. Unfortunately, most of the other images were removed from this thread previously and the overall picture is obscured by that decision.
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_________________ Netgear R8500
Last edited by puremind on Tue Jul 09, 2019 21:50; edited 5 times in total
This code placed on /jffs/etc/config/start.startup on R8500 under r40189 fw will keep all the lights (including the 4 on the antennas) indefinitely disabled:
Your theoretical wifi speeds look great......with zero clients connected.
I thought it had been stated by the dev's more than numerous times that the "channel" should always be selected. Or it likely won't properly negotiate VHT80 or VHT40....at least not consistently.
On top of that...There is NO smart logic being used when it randomly picks a channel when set to auto....usually picking one that is already in use within range.
You weren't clear... Was it Merlin that effed up your CFE in the first place?
You're the first R8500 I've seen....not that I'm looking..
Usually it's the R7000 being jacked up by playing with Xwrt-Vortex.
Either way, it's funny how the solution usually comes from dd-wrt & the good community here. Instead of the dev that is supplying the..."questionable"...code.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ _________________ Location 1
R7800- DD-WRT v3.0-r53562 (10/03/23) Gateway
WNDR3400v1 DD-WRT v3.0-r35531_mega-nv64k (03/26/18 ) Access Point
WRT160Nv3 DD-WRT ?v3?.0-r35531 mini (03/26/18 ) Access Point
WRT54GSv5 DD-WRT v24-r33555_micro_generic (10/20/17) Repeater
Location 2
R7800- DD-WRT v3.0-r51855 (02/25/23) Gateway
R6300v2- DD-WRT v3.0-r50671 (10-26-22) Access Point
WNDR3700v2 DD-WRT v3.0-r35531 std (03/26/18 ) Access Point
E1200 v2 DD-WRT v3.0-r35531 mega-nv64k (03/26/18 ) Gateway(for trivial reasons)
RBWAPG-5HACT2HND-BE RouterOS-v6.46.4 (2/21/20) Outdoor Access Point
2x RBSXTG-5HPACD RouterOS-v6.46.4 (2/21/20) PTP Bridge 866.6Mbps-1GbpsLAN
Location 3
2x R7000- DD-WRT v3.0-r50671 (10/26/22) Access Points
2x RBWAPG-60AD RouterOS-v6.45.9 (04/30/20) PTP Bridge 2.3Gbps-1GbpsLAN
2x RBSXTsqG-5acD RouterOS-v6.49.7 (10/14/22) PTP Bridge 866.6Mbps-1GbpsLAN Thank You BrainSlayer for ALL that you do & have done, also to "most" everyone here that shares their knowledge
Koolshare firmware for Netgear, including R8500, is based on Merlin + Vortex ASUS FW
After flashing the CFE then DDWRT was able to keep settings stored.
Leaving the note here in case it helps somebody else, as the mtd commands offered in other posts never worked while my commands up there did.
Auto channels for Merlin , Koolshare or stock FW gave me the top speed via Wi-Fi
While for DDWRT was very poor speed without fiddling big time. Definitely something to improve there. _________________ Netgear R8500
The damns ads and the DNS breaking all over. Really?
If this helps, I've managed to get the damn thing working after a few days of battling.
Get a cheap usb stick and plug it in the USB 2 0 port, disable JFFS in memory and only use and mount the USB stick for everything, jffs, swap and optware... you must do this in order to get everything proper!
You can then install optware (when YOU have /opt and /jffs pointing to the usb stick)
For MIPSEL based devices (Broadcom, not dual core), this:
#Here your favourite DNSs or open DNS or whatever is NOT your ISP
server=9.9.9.9
server=8.8.8.8
read-ethers
#Here your additional /etc/hosts files to remove adds, same format as someonewhocares
addn-hosts=/etc/hosts.dnsmasq
quiet-dhcp
quiet-dhcp6
quiet-ra
#Here your forced dhcps
dhcp-host=aa:aa:aa:aa:aa:aa,nameofyourlaptop,192.168.1.10,7d
You'd get your router to server DNS via DNSMASq using as servers quad9 and 8.8.8.8 but blocking whatever is on /etc/hosts
To get /etc/hosts autoupdated to remove a lot of ads sites and crap, put this portion to /jffs/etc/config/start.startup for incremental updates. If you want other places to get ads lists from, serve yourselves.
EDIT: Script has been copied to a text attachment.
#This is to refresh the list of blocked sites for ads and anything else that's on /etc/hosts
curl -k -X GET https://someonewhocares.org/hosts/hosts -o /jffs/dnsmasqtempnew
cat /jffs/dnsmasqtempnew >> /jffs/dnsmasqtemp
cat /jffs/dnsmasqtemp | sed -e 's/^[ t]*//' | grep -v ^# | sort | uniq > /jffs/dnsmasqtempnew
cat /jffs/dnsmasqtempnew > /jffs/dnsmasqtemp
cat /jffs/dnsmasqtemp >> /etc/hosts[/code]