Posted: Mon Mar 01, 2010 7:27 Post subject: Having trouble with wireless speeds in mixed environment
First off, the 13832 build has been much easier for me to get running and stable than either of the prior builds, and it solved one of the first problems I had which was getting actual N wireless speeds out of the early build. It's currently configured as a basic gateway, nothing out of the ordinary.
The problem now is that for me to get 100Mb+ N speeds to my N devices I have to force MIMO - Transmission Fixed Rate to 15 - 270Mbps. This would be fine, except for doing that, prevents any of the old G devices I have running (a wireless security cam and an old laptop) from connecting to the wireless. Setting it to auto, puts the router back to 54Mbps. (As seen on the wireless status page, and on all clients) I may have misunderstood the setting, but I thought that it should use the maximum rate for each client when in auto, and could fall back to slower speeds for the individually slower clients. Is this something I can configure or diagnose better? I've messed with multiple configurations of transmission rates, and I don't appear to be able to get N speeds with G devices on the network. Any advice? I'm not up to speed on all the shell commands so I don't know if there is any info I can glean from there. Or will everything just have to be moved to N and junk the old G camera?
I read on most forums that WRT310N v2 had slow down speeds probnlems. Had this router running for 3 days now and yeah, it is currently slowing down. Getting 2mbits down speed while my connection is 7.5, which was working great at first. Does upgrading to DD-WRT solve this issue ? Or should I either downgrade to a WRT160N, or upgrade to a WRT610N (which is currently 150 bucks at a store near home for some days).
Flashed my WRT310N v2 with dd-wrt.v24-13832_NEWD-2_K2.6_mini_wrt310nv2.bin since users are saying this is the more stable build so far. Seems good, we'll se in few days.
I just watched my ping time go up to 56 seconds!!!!
While 56 seconds is excessive, many devices, especially when under load, put a very low priority on ICMP packets. Ping can be a useful tool, but it doesn't always tell the whole story. iperf is a much better gauge of actual connection rates.
I am using r13832 since this one seems the more stable at the moment. Otherwise, browse ftp://ftp.dd-wrt.com/others/eko/BrainSlayer-V24-preSP2/ there is 2 newest revisions. Be sure to select broadcom_K26 and small builds (less than 4mb)
I am using r13832 since this one seems the more stable at the moment. Otherwise, browse ftp://ftp.dd-wrt.com/others/eko/BrainSlayer-V24-preSP2/ there is 2 newest revisions. Be sure to select broadcom_K26 and small builds (less than 4mb)
Sweet. I'll work on it this weekend. Did you try it already?
I got a 310nV2 from a futureshop where I live (im glad I checked it was a V2 and not a V1!), never knew about DD-WRT existence (or the ability to even put new firmwares on linksys routers) until I got the bright idea to google 'replacement linksys firmware' and up came DDWRT.
As the device support listing page said 310nv2's are a WIP (work in progress), I hunted the forums until I found this thread. From following the comment stream it appeared that dd-wrt.v24-13832_NEWD-2_K2.6_mini_wrt310nv2.bin was the best functional build so far for the nv2. After reading the many stories of people bricking their routers I was freaked about doing it myself.. but went ahead and did it anyways. I found out that there was alot of conflicting information about the exact proper procedure, and a few people got bricked somehow. So im writing this for them as well
Converting a Virgin 310nV2 to DDWRT for noobs (worked for me anyways):
1. While on, push and hold down the reset button continously for 30 seconds, unplug the power while continuing to hold for another 30 seconds, then plug back in while continuing to hold reset button for a final 30 seconds. (90 second button hold-down time)
2. Go to http://192.168.1.1 from a computer, and instead of the normal linksys control panel you'll see a "management" window with 2 options, to upload a new firmware and reset the NVRAM. Click on 'Reset NVRAM' to reset NVRAM. Wait a few seconds, then unplug the router for several seconds, then plug back in.
3. Go to http://192.168.1.1 again, and this time use login 'admin' and password 'admin' to login.
5. Now unplug your router for a minute, then plug back in. Go to http://192.168.1.1 and you should see DDWRT's control panel, don't touch anything yet. Wait about 2 mins before heading to step 6.
6. Repeat Step #1 (30-30-30 Hard Reset).
7. Go to http://192.168.1.1 and you'll once again see the Linksys management screen. This time hit 'Erase NVRAM', unplug and plug back in your router. (Don't skip this step!)
8. Your done! Finally go to http://192.168.1.1 and enter the username and password you wish to use.
Setting the Router's Clock:
9. IMPORTANT: Ive noticed that sometimes the router will not beable to set its own clock and the NTP feature is broken. There is 2 ways to set the clock: One is using the standard unix DATE command from the telnet shell/web 'commands' tab ( http://192.168.1.1/Diagnostics.asp in the router config). Here's an example command string:
date -s "2 OCT 2006 18:00:00"
1. The other method is to temporarily set a NTP server on the bottom of the setup tab ( http://192.168.1.1/index.asp) (use pool.ntp.org),
3. Then disable NTP client from the Setup menu afterwards.
If you dont set the clock, then the WAN logger doesn't seem to work.
This procedure worked for me. I have been running 13832 for a week or so now and performance wise its MUCH better than the stock linksys, just make sure you leave the NTP time server option disabled or the CPU eventually maxes out (like others have said on this thread).
For both wireless and wired clients I get pings < 1ms between clients, all the time. DDWRT is awesome. Im a nub and pulled it off without bricking myself. Im proud for some lame reason lol
Edit: Added for a friend
How to reset DDWRT's password if you forgot it just after installing:
1. While on, push and hold down the reset button continously for 30 seconds, unplug the power while continuing to hold for another 30 seconds, then plug back in while continuing to hold reset button for a final 30 seconds. (This is called a 30-30-30 hard reset) (90 second button hold-down time total)
2. Go to http://192.168.1.1 and you'll see the linksys management window, click 'Erase NVRAM' to reset DDWRT back to defaults.
3. Unplug router for a minute, then plug back in. Go to http://192.168.1.1 and set a new username and password
And finally, if you set the HTTPS option in the config and now the web interface is dead
(you can do the above 3 steps to erase NVRAM OR do this: (Windows))
1. Go to start..run and type in CMD (to open a command window).
2. Type at the prompt: telnet 192.168.1.1
3. You'll see a login prompt, type 'root'.
4. For password, enter the password you originally set for the webgui, it will work here as the password.
5. If all is successful, you'll see a DDWRT logo in ascii-art welcoming you to a unix prompt.
6. Type in prompt: erase nvram
7. Type in prompt: reboot
8. Go to http://192.168.1.1 and set a new router username/password (and reconfig the whole router for that matter).
(The above is to help all my friends all of a suddenly wanting DDWRT)
Last edited by virinix on Mon Mar 15, 2010 22:34; edited 3 times in total
9. IMPORTANT: Ive noticed that sometimes the router will not beable to set its own clock and the NTP feature is broken. There is 2 ways to set the clock: One is using the standard unix DATE command from the telnet shell/web 'commands' tab. Here's an example command string:
date -s "2 OCT 2006 18:00:00"
The other method is to temporarily set a NTP server (use pool.ntp.org), wait a couple minutes until the DATE command returns the proper date and time, then disable NTP client from the Setup menu afterwards. If you dont set the clock, then the WAN logger doesn't seem to work.
Where do I go to enter the command string for the date?
Where do I go to enter the command string for the date?
You can do it using by either:
1) Navigating to your router's web-gui. Then going to Administration | Commands. Type in your command and hit 'Run Command'
2) Log in to your router via ssh client and you'll be presented with command shell. Type in your command there
I've installed the new firmware. The one suggested in the guide 2 posts above, but I can't seem to port forward. Like I set them, but they don't seem to really stick. I tried forwarding ports for my bittorrent but it says it's never open. UPnP worked but setting my own ports doesn't. This is kind of bad since I need other programs to port forward to my IP, most of them don't have UPnP.
EDIT: tried checking ports with PFPortChecker, but even it can't find the ports I've opened.
