Posted: Thu Mar 18, 2021 7:52 Post subject: Recommended Build for R7000 or R7800
Been away from DD-WRT for a while. Running OpenWRT on my R7800 and getting frustrating wifi drops a few times a day. It's a known issue I can't clear.
Yesterday I put DD-WRT on a WRT3200ACM router and I just could not get the 2.4GHz channel to work correctly. I have about a million ESP8266 devices and they would connect, and then drop sporadically. I spent the whole day flashing versions and trying every setting in wifi. Seems there are still Marvel driver issues.
So last night I flashed latest beta to R7000 (I have a lot of old routers laying around) but will set it up on the network later and hopefully it will work fine.
I do not want to blast my R7800 OpenWRT router just yet. It does work, just the wifi just completely dies 2-4 times a day for a minute or so. But everything does work and my network has a lot of different devices.
Ideally I'd like to install the R7000 and make sure it is semi-bullet proof before I put DD-WRT on the R7800.
Can anyone recommend a solid build with wifi for R7000 or R7800? Latest version? Latest beta? Older build?
The R7000 and R7800 are widely used and are the best supported routers/platform so you are in luck
You can use the latest build as of today 46069 for both
I use that build since yesterday for the R7800 family router (see the build threads as outlined in the forum guidelines)
Only problem can be if you want to use the router as a NAS, ksmbd (the Samba client) is a WIP (OpenWRT has the same problems )
I also use OpenWRT for another R7800, but the family router uses DDWRT as I want that to be stable (I build myself for OpenWRT and tinker a lot with it)
Thanks. I have installed latest and just deployed the R7000. Seems to be working fine except for one ESP8266 device which I think might be a hardware problem. (WLED Led Strip......seems to be a power issue maybe and not network related). Probably just noticed it because I'm trying all the stuff.
If this stays up for a couple days with no drops I'll put DD-WRT on the R7800 and deploy it.
I previously had Merlin firmware on the R7000. It was probably working fine and then I upgraded to the R7800.
At home I run a pfSense firewall and have routers on two separate VLAN's. One is my Network and the other is segregated and is a guest network
Every time OpenWRT would drop a lot of my computers would snatch on to the guest network and every time I would go to transfer a file or something I would have to go around and put the computers back on "my" network. No easy task as there are computers and devices all over the place and I do a lot of 3D printing and laser cutting and do the designs on one computer and try to send the files to the computer connected to whichever device I want to use.
WiFi drops and network changes were getting unacceptable.
Probably should have never left DD-WRT to play with Merlin and OpenWRT.
God years ago I ran Tomato on an old Linksys router and it was beyond rock solid.
Joined: 16 Nov 2015 Posts: 6435 Location: UK, London, just across the river..
Posted: Thu Mar 18, 2021 12:38 Post subject:
ho1Aetoo wrote:
R7000 Broadcom
R7800 Atheros
can not be compared, Broadcom is closed source and Atheros is open source.
completely different drivers and atheros is actively developed
That's true, regarding WiFi only, in terms of stability like the OP asks, 46069 on my routers its fine, as well it contains all necessary security patches and performance tweaks, do keep in mind WiFi Vanilla driver and Plex server integration are still in W.I.P. _________________ Atheros
TP-Link WR740Nv1 ---DD-WRT 55630 WAP
TP-Link WR1043NDv2 -DD-WRT 55723 Gateway/DoT,Forced DNS,Ad-Block,Firewall,x4VLAN,VPN
TP-Link WR1043NDv2 -Gargoyle OS 1.15.x AP,DNS,QoS,Quotas
Qualcomm-Atheros
Netgear XR500 --DD-WRT 55779 Gateway/DoH,Forced DNS,AP Isolation,4VLAN,Ad-Block,Firewall,Vanilla
Netgear R7800 --DD-WRT 55779 Gateway/DoT,AD-Block,Forced DNS,AP&Net Isolation,x3VLAN,Firewall,Vanilla
Netgear R9000 --DD-WRT 55779 Gateway/DoT,AD-Block,AP Isolation,Firewall,Forced DNS,x2VLAN,Vanilla
Broadcom
Netgear R7000 --DD-WRT 55460 Gateway/SmartDNS/DoH,AD-Block,Firewall,Forced DNS,x3VLAN,VPN
NOT USING 5Ghz ANYWHERE
------------------------------------------------------
Stubby DNS over TLS I DNSCrypt v2 by mac913
can not be compared, Broadcom is closed source and Atheros is open source.
completely different drivers and atheros is actively developed
That's why I can't understand why the R7800 OpenWRT wifi is so buggy. My R7000 is performing beautifully. Soon as it instills some real confidence then I'll flash the R7800 to DD-WRT.
Joined: 08 May 2018 Posts: 14208 Location: Texas, USA
Posted: Thu Mar 18, 2021 16:37 Post subject:
These questions are subjective to case use scenarios (and should generally be avoided). It is generally best practice to use the latest public release. Apparently, we *must repeat* this advice constantly. Personally, I have no issues with either DD or OpenWRT on R7800. _________________ "Life is but a fleeting moment, a vapor that vanishes quickly; All is vanity"
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Linux User #377467 counter.li.org / linuxcounter.net
These questions are subjective to case use scenarios (and should generally be avoided). It is generally best practice to use the latest public release. Apparently, we *must repeat* this advice constantly. Personally, I have no issues with either DD or OpenWRT on R7800.
I live in neighborhood where everybody isn't too close but there are kind of multiple houses nearby. I pick up a boatload of wifi channels. It's possible my R7800 drops have something to do with interference but doubtful because sometimes they happen in the middle of the night.
I forget everything I've done but there are different drivers for the 7800 and I've installed them and configured everything every way you can configure it. So far, I'm about 9 hours into my R7000 DD-WRT with no drops and every single bizarre ESP8266 device I own hooking right up to it.
R7800 on OpenWRT drove me nuts. Can never rule out hardware problems too, I guess.
Joined: 16 Nov 2015 Posts: 6435 Location: UK, London, just across the river..
Posted: Thu Mar 18, 2021 18:24 Post subject:
well...in all my DDWRT experience i've never had a WiFi issues using R7000 and R7800 among various clients...
Its all down to settings and bad clients....
My experience with OpenWRT is, a bad WiFi...complicated GUI...
but Kong OpenWRT builds (since he left DDWRT) on R7800 are rock solid....haven't checked his recent OpenWRT builds...but DDWRT rocks and has much better and understandable GUI and CLI to me...(im attached to DDWRT)
do not use:
Auto Channel and some fancy settings...
if interested i can send you a pic of my WiFi settings if so...im using 2.4Ghz only... _________________ Atheros
TP-Link WR740Nv1 ---DD-WRT 55630 WAP
TP-Link WR1043NDv2 -DD-WRT 55723 Gateway/DoT,Forced DNS,Ad-Block,Firewall,x4VLAN,VPN
TP-Link WR1043NDv2 -Gargoyle OS 1.15.x AP,DNS,QoS,Quotas
Qualcomm-Atheros
Netgear XR500 --DD-WRT 55779 Gateway/DoH,Forced DNS,AP Isolation,4VLAN,Ad-Block,Firewall,Vanilla
Netgear R7800 --DD-WRT 55779 Gateway/DoT,AD-Block,Forced DNS,AP&Net Isolation,x3VLAN,Firewall,Vanilla
Netgear R9000 --DD-WRT 55779 Gateway/DoT,AD-Block,AP Isolation,Firewall,Forced DNS,x2VLAN,Vanilla
Broadcom
Netgear R7000 --DD-WRT 55460 Gateway/SmartDNS/DoH,AD-Block,Firewall,Forced DNS,x3VLAN,VPN
NOT USING 5Ghz ANYWHERE
------------------------------------------------------
Stubby DNS over TLS I DNSCrypt v2 by mac913
Hi so just to confirm, how you did flash the R7000 ? I did see the guide for the r7800 ( https://forum.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=320614 ) and said to go straight from the netgear stock firm to dd-wrt. But on the folder beta for dd-wrt r7000 firmware : there<s also a .CHK. factory-to-dd-wrt.chk
So have you just flash the .cHK file as being the same as the .img of the r7800 file ? then after log into and do the netgear-r7000-webflash.bin..
That's why I can't understand why the R7800 OpenWRT wifi is so buggy. My R7000 is performing beautifully. Soon as it instills some real confidence then I'll flash the R7800 to DD-WRT.
I am not sure whether I share the same enthusiasm as you about OpenWrt on R7800. I use it daily and don't have any wifi drop issues as you mention. I used Hnyman's build before and now use ACwifidude's NSS build (21.02). Best performance so far and bufferbloat is a grand A+ and get the full 500/500 on my connection.
I really enjoy OpenWrt on R7800 and this is a DD-WRT thread, so don't want to derail it. LOL. _________________ Netgear R7800 [DD-WRT]; ASUS RT-87U [DD-WRT]; ASUS RT-AC68U [FreshTomato]
Joined: 08 May 2018 Posts: 14208 Location: Texas, USA
Posted: Thu Mar 18, 2021 21:18 Post subject:
Docop1 wrote:
Hi so just to confirm, how you did flash the R7000 ? I did see the guide for the r7800 ( https://forum.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=320614 ) and said to go straight from the netgear stock firm to dd-wrt. But on the folder beta for dd-wrt r7000 firmware : there<s also a .CHK. factory-to-dd-wrt.chk
So have you just flash the .cHK file as being the same as the .img of the r7800 file ? then after log into and do the netgear-r7000-webflash.bin..
thanks
factory-to-dd-wrt.chk is for initial flash, netgear-r7000-webflash.bin is for upgrading/downgrading to another release. I am sure there is a thread specific to the R7000 somewhere in this forum _________________ "Life is but a fleeting moment, a vapor that vanishes quickly; All is vanity"
Contribute To DD-WRT Pogo - A minimal level of ability is expected and needed... DD-WRT Releases 2023 (PolitePol)
DD-WRT Releases 2023 (RSS Everything)
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Linux User #377467 counter.li.org / linuxcounter.net
if interested i can send you a pic of my WiFi settings if so...im using 2.4Ghz only...
Can you please post a snapshot of your wl0/wl1 settings (basic + advanced screens) and your firewall settings page? Would like to see whether I am using all the important settings like a guru, such as yourself?
Thank you in advance. _________________ Netgear R7800 [DD-WRT]; ASUS RT-87U [DD-WRT]; ASUS RT-AC68U [FreshTomato]
