Please see post about 4 down -- I have replaced the Airgo card with Broadcom, so I think this first post is fairly irrelevant now.
I'm sorry if this has been hashed out already, but I'm unable to find any reliable search results. I've searched on Google and come up empty-handed, and the dd-wrt wiki page has GX listed in the title, but no actual GX information there, which is a let-down.
Okay, so here goes... I have a WRT54GX v1 (Linksys yada-yada, SRX Speed and Range eXpansion). Apparently from reading it has some form of "Airgo" wifi chipset.
From what I read a while back through a similar search ( https://forum.openwrt.org/viewtopic.php?pid=63526 ), I found that someone had done some work on getting the airgo chipset supported in openwrt, but the thread seemed old and abandoned shortly after it was started. I'm unsure if any more progress was made though.
So my question for everyone is this: Is there any decent firmware available for the GX that supports the chipset? I don't even really care about the SRX stuff, I just want G functionality, with DD-WRT's awesome capabilities. Right now I'd primarily use it as a wireless bridge (client mode), if possible.
Some info from searching around:
Version: 1.0
Broadcom BCM4704 @ 266 MHz
RAM: 16 MB
Flash: 4 MB
Serial Starts with: KBG5
Last edited by Liath on Tue Jul 20, 2010 8:31; edited 4 times in total
Since you have the router, why do search the net for info about the wifi chip?
Why don't you open it and look what you have? _________________ Kernel panic: Aiee, killing interrupt handler!
The issue is that there are different posts saying that it works, others say it doesn't.
The wiki page says 'no official support', but I don't care if it is official, just if someone has put together something that works, which is where I'm getting confused due to differing forum posts.
Of course it doesn't help that the X at the end of the model people also use as (*) wildcard... goofs up search results about everywhere.
Also, I have a few wireless mini-PCI cards laying around, so if the AirGo chipset is just completely not doable, then I can apparently replace it. So then the issue is if the mainboard can be supported.
Posted: Tue Jul 20, 2010 7:49 Post subject: Mainboard compatible?
Update: The wireless card is completely replaceable, using a mini-pci slot. So, I can put just about any wireless card I wish into it.
I have a Broadcom BCM94318MPG I can try -- it is in the pci slot of the wrt54gx right now.
Next question is if it is safe to flash this board, and what I should flash it *with*, since it is no longer a real "wrt54gx" without the airgo card.
If at all possible, I'd like to not do anything that involves turning the router into a guinea pig. It works fine with the Airgo, but I can't get several features I'd like. So I'd like to try DD-WRT, but want to make sure that I can (somewhat) safely flash the unit without completely b0rking it. I don't have a JTAG so I can only use tftp.
I'm sure that if I can get this working though, that many other people with this model would love to know how they can get it working.
Since you have the router, why do search the net for info about the wifi chip?
Why don't you open it and look what you have?
The Airgo chip from what I'm reading, isn't going to be supported as Airgo refuses to release source for it.
Easily fixed though. Replaced the wifi card I think I'm lucky that; A) the unit is easy as heck to crack open, and B) the wifi is m-pci and therefore replaceable!
I'm just a tad bit scared to power the unit on with the new card in it, in case the linksys firmware decides to crash and brick the router
Joined: 20 Nov 2009 Posts: 93 Location: United States
Posted: Wed Jul 21, 2010 9:38 Post subject:
The Linksys firmware will probably just make the new card not work. All you lose is Wi-Fi as the rest of the unit is intact. If Linksys really did put in code to check the card and issue a problem then you can just insert the old card back and it will be just like it was. As for how "Generic" the generic builds are you will need to check if any routers support the chipset for your new card. If yes than it will be fine. If no then you need to ask the creators (Eko, Brainslayer) about it as they might be working on something or make a custom firmware compile. _________________ Linksys WRT350Nv1 x1 DD-WRT v24-preSP2 14311-Not In Use
Linksys WRT54G2v1 x1 DD-WRT v24-preSP2 14311-Not In Use
Linksys WRT54G2v1 x1 Linksys OEM
Linksys EG008Wv3 x1
Linksys WRT54Gv3.1 x1 Linksys OEM
Linksys WRT54Gv5 x1 Linksys OEM
Linksys WRT54Gv6 x2 Linksys OEM
Linksys WRT54Gv8 x2 Linksys OEM
Linksys WTR54GSv1 x1 Linksys OEM
Linksys WRT160Nv1 x1 Linksys OEM
NetGear WNR834Bv2 x1 DD-WRT 25251
NetGear WG302v2 x1 Netgear OEM
Belkin F5D7230-4v1000 x1 Belkin OEM
Buffalo WHR-G300N x1 DD-WRT sp2
Buffalo WHR-G300N x1 Buffalo OEM
Airlink 101 AR430Wv1 x1 Airlink OEM
Cisco Catalyst 3548 Enterprise x1 Cisco IOS-Not In Use
D-Link DI-604vE x1 D-Link OEM-Not In Use
I don't see it mentioned anywhere, so did you verify that the switch chip is Broadcom based too? You ought to post some pictures of the board.
If it has a serial pad on the board then first thing you should do is get a copy of the boot log. Also check if it has jtag and back up the CFE if it does so that you can restore it if needed. If you don't do this then you're likely to brick it with no way to recover. You can buy serial and jtag cables really cheap ($15 total) and they'll come in handy in the future.
After you prepare for recovering, then try a mini generic build. The LED's probably won't work right until you test the GPIO's and get them added to the source code.
Well, have to work today, but when I get a chance, I'll pull the thing apart again, and take some pictures.
Don't have a JTAG cable at the moment, and if I get one it'd have to be one where I don't need to use solder, 'cause I absolutely suck at soldering :P
From what I understand the guts of the machine are identical to the Belkin F5D8230-4, and someone managed to get OpenWRT running on it, but had to replace the wifi card. https://forum.openwrt.org/viewtopic.php?pid=113937
This is actually what gave me the idea, but I could make literally no sense of that thread, and I'm not sure if anyone actually posted a full build.
It seems there there is possibly jtag header already pinned on the board? also, I have no clue what the white jumper connector in the center of the board is for.