Linksys Adds Linux WRT54G Model Back

Glenn Fleishman writes "Last month, Slashdot and others wrote about how the Linksys WRT54G, a popular embedded Linux-based Wi-Fi gateway, had switched to VxWorks's OS for its v5 release. Because the WRT54G has become the standard as a cheap commodity device for building your own platform (like Sveasoft, Fon, and many others), this seemed like a big blow to hackers and developers. If you could still manage to flash the device--not sure if that was possible--it had half the RAM and flash of the v4 model. It turns out Linksys wasn't killing the Linux model. They've released it as the WRT54GL with v4.30.0(US) firmware and will sell it under that name for about $70 retail. It's already in stock and the new firmware is on their GPL software download page. Linux sales represent a few percentage points of their overall volume, based on the Linksys product director's remarks. The lesser quantity of RAM puts money back in their pockets on the mainstream model."

Comments

Difference between versions?

[kc32]

I have a v3.3 sitting right beside me. What's the difference between v3.3 and v4?

Re:Difference between versions?

[VAXGeek]

0.7

Re:Difference between versions?

[the_maddman]

The v4.0 (which I have) uses a SoC that combines two chips from the v3.3. It's pretty much exactly the same software wise, just cheaper for Linksys to make.

Re:Difference between versions?

[Avantare]

Me thinks .7

Re:Difference between versions?

[the_bard17]

Nah... the v is present in both, so the v in the minuend would be rendered null by the subtrahend.

Unless you're considering v to be a unit of measure, at which point it would better syntax to place the v at the end of the amount, rather than at the front.

Re:Difference between versions?

[John Nowak]

No.

The distance BETWEEN 4.0 and 3.3 is 0.7 (between is always the absolute value).
The distance FROM 3.3 TO 4.0 is also 0.7.
Only the instance TO 3.3 FROM 4.0 is -0.7.

God.

Re:Difference between versions?

[spiderbitendeath]

Only on slashdot does a joke about version numbers get turned into a lecture on the proper use of symbols.

Re:open

[slashflood]

Two words for you: power consumption. One more: noise.

Re:open

[phoenix.bam!]

MTA that doesn't go down when you shut your computer off at night. A nice ssh gateway between the outside and internal network and blah blah blah

Re:open

[TheCarp]

What?

um... you are joking right? Having a linux kernel on the router is great. It means being able to write iptables processing rules for your packets.

It gives you alot of flexibility beyond just being a firewall and ip masquerader. Plus you can do great things if you care about security. Syslog to a loghost dropped packet logs maybe?

Admittedly your setup will work just as well, but this is sleak and can be easily deployed and maintained.

-Steve

money in the pockets

[way2trivial]

better (likely) represented by the fact that
anyone who buys the more expensive model is 90% more likely to load their own firmware *since that is the market it's for*
    and Linksys will be a whole lot less responsive to people making warranty claims when they fuckup the firmware flash.

calling tech support and saying "I dunno" what happened is not gonna cut it on these models.. void the warranty, no service for you...
that will undoubtedly keep a few bucks in their pockets from less repairs....

Re:money in the pockets

[metalhed77]

Slashdot: where there's a conspiracy in everything.

Because seriously, I want to hear you make the business case for allowing returns on models with flashed firmware. What company wants to tie up their helplines with the clueless newbies who will surely start whining after flashing their firmware.

Re:money in the pockets

[way2trivial]

no, the point is-

previously, if I had a standard model, try the svea firmware, and fuck it up... I call linksys and say "it stopped working" and "I didn't do pnuthin" I ship it in, they send a refurb almost immediately. This costs them money.

now-- they can keep a few bucks by asking pointed and expected questions, upgrading the firmware is WHY this machine exists- but undoubtedly not a covered by warranty use. As buying it implies intended use that is not covered by warranty--- and denying the claim entirely.

Re:money in the pockets

[Have Blue]

It's common knowledge that geeks tend to disdain tech support and like to (and have the skills to) fix their own problems. Why shouldn't Linksys try to take advantage of this pre-existing market segmentation? They didnt *have* to keep the router flashable, they could have saved even more money by cancelling the model entirely and only selling the one with too little RAM.

Re:money in the pockets

[way2trivial]

1st- sometimes when a firmware flash goes bad, the hardware is DEAD. not repairable. trash.
                  for that occurence, a common remedy is going to customer service/support, lying, and asking for an exchange under warranty.

2nd- they could NOT release a router where the firmware is not flashable, and stay competitive.

they've closed the loophole, that undoubtedly cost them money unfairly. I applaud the thought..
I think it's cool because it serves two purposes, keeps hardware out there for hackers (original not media definition)
and keeps them from getting burned for experimental failures for which they shouldn't be responsible.

Re:money in the pockets

[LinuxGeek]

When a firmware flash goes bad, the sure way to resurect is a JTAG cable and software ( i.e. the debricking kit).

The only dead routers I have seen were not killed by the bad flash attempt, but during the resurrection attempts by shorting the wrong pins and frying the flash chip or worse.

Re:money in the pockets

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

1st- sometimes when a firmware flash goes bad, the hardware is DEAD. not repairable. trash. ...
they've closed the loophole, that undoubtedly cost them money unfairly. I applaud the thought..

If they really had a problem with too many units with bad flashes coming back, they should have redesigned the product so that you could hard-reset it back to a minimally flashable state instead of being completely locked out.

In fact, now that they have a model that is specifically marketed to users who intend to flash upgrade, leaving such a major product reliability issue unresolved probably makes the unit unfit for its intended use and thus subject to at least as many warranty issues, and probably a class-action suit if they won't service those warranty claims.

Re:money in the pockets

[aywwts4]

"leaving such a major product reliability issue unresolved probably makes the unit unfit for its intended use and thus subject to at least as many warranty issues, and probably a class-action suit if they won't service those warranty claims."

This is why we cant have nice things. You dont get a device you can futz with with a nice warantee. Next your going to say AMD shouldnt make their high end processors the best at overclocking, then not give me a replacement when I melt mine.

Re:money in the pockets

[Mr. Flibble]

As buying it implies intended use that is not covered by warranty--- and denying the claim entirely.

And this, IMO is fair. After all, if you flash it, and you brick it, and then you try to warranty it, you are really cheating Linksys. They are telling you, Hey we will support you UNLESS YOU DO X. So you do X it breaks, and then you claim warranty? That is duplicitous.

It would be like backing over it in your car, and then saying "I dunno what when wrong with it.." The only difference being that Linksys could tell if you backed over it in your car, in this case they cannot. Linksys is a company that exists to make a profit. Bricking your router by doing something non-warranty safe and getting a replacement is unfair to Linksys - big faceless corporation or not.

Re:money in the pockets

[Anonymous Coward]

Bricking your router by doing something non-warranty safe and getting a replacement is unfair to Linksys - big faceless corporation or not

Yea, just like bricking your PC by uninstalling the warranty-safe Windows and installing some open source junk like Linux, right?

Those who actually have experience with OpenWRT understand the OS loads in a manner interchangeable with the Linksys OS, and in fact, is possible because Linksys's own OS was based on Linux. That we would prefer to run a more flexible build and be reducing, not increasing tech support calls (as we're certainly not going to get support from OpenWRT) is a gain to Linksys. When we buy 500 units to put around the corporate campus in remote kismet drone mode, that's a sale that benefits Linksys, and when we have well trained and certified techs maintaining them, we're not about to be a support issue. Those that don't know how to responsibly brick the OS stay with the default OS and bother Linksys a hell of a lot more.

The real issue here is that Linksys, under Cisco management, has been consistently dumbing down products and replacing reliable components with junk. Consider their WET-11 which became a staple in home wifi LANs. When Cisco got ahold of Linksys, they replaced the 40 mw wifi radio with a 30 mw unit, allegedly to resolve flash-death issues (the units would suffer very rapid declines in stability due to poor circuitry protection of the flash memory, requiring frequent power cycling and eventually going DOA in less than a year - typically more than 70% we dealt with suffered this fate). So they fixed the wrong thing without telling or updating the product literature to advise it was no longer 40 mw.

Imagine sending in a few hundred for RMA only to get a unit back that goes into an office and no longer connects at all (due to a lower powered radio that suffered high levels of variability on the output). 30 mw was the top end... 15-25 mw more likely.

So they went to the dumpster. Our corporate put in a Linksys ban (actually a Cisco ban until IT told the CFO that Cisco and Linksys were somewhat different, though we're seeing issues with Cisco reliability now too).

My question for those that might know: who is the cheapskate at Cisco who's making these decisions and killing their reliability?

Re:money in the pockets

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

This is why we cant have nice things. You dont get a device you can futz with with a nice warantee.

Bullshit.

If futzing is an official part of the marketing of said device it better be warranteed. Otherwise what you are saying is the equivalent of, "cars are good for looking pretty sitting in your driveway, but if the engine fails to make yours move on its own, don't expect that to be warranteed."

Next your going to say AMD shouldnt make their high end processors the best at overclocking, then not give me a replacement when I melt mine.

Does AMD advertise the overlocking ability of said processor? If they do, then they better be prepared for the consequences of people using it they way they advertise it.

Re:money in the pockets

[jridley]

1st- sometimes when a firmware flash goes bad, the hardware is DEAD. not repairable. trash.

Not true, most of the time. You can open the box up and short a couple of wires, causing the bootstrap to decide the FLASH is corrupt, and TFTP a new firmware in.

I bricked my 54G last month, and got it back via this method. From reading the forums, at least 90% of failed flash upgrades can be recovered from. There's a reason there are people out on eBay and other places buying bricked routers. They're de-bricking them and reselling them.

Re:money in the pockets

[Cylix]

Not so!

I had a bad flash on a dlink model once or rather it was a bad revision of their code.

So it foobared my unit and I emailed them and explained what was going on. They were able to reproduce the problem and pulled the firmware off their site.

Now, I thought my unit was toast, but they actually gave me a quick instruction lesson on getting to a stripped down firmware intended for flashing. Nifty huh.

So a bad flash may not truly kill your router.

Re:money in the pockets

[aywwts4]

No, Cars have the intended purpose of driving. It is fully within their specs, If your car blows up while driving down the street, Thats covered. If you buy a hotrod it is up to you if you want to squeeze out a few extra horsepower. But, use to much Nox, Ruin your engine and its your problem. There is even a car out there, the SCION which is advertised specifically for people to mod it, hell their commercials show people turning it into a variable transformer, but they cannot protect you from your own stupidity. Its your device, do with it as you want, a warranty is here to protect you from defects in workmanship. That is to say, the factory's workmanship, Not Yours.

Hell, In advertisements you wont see this called the Linksys Hackable Whatever Flavor of Linux You Want Without Risk Router, Its the same as that other router, just with more ram, Do with it as you will.

Re:money in the pockets

[japhmi]

I'm trying to figure out how someone rated this 'redundant.' I was pointing out that the first person said 'sometimes' and that the second person was trying to disagree, but only changed words (to 'most of the time'). Was I modded down because I assumed a level of intelligence of Slashdoters to understand that? Did someone else point out the same thing? No.

Re:open

[JanneM]

It does make sense to have one "internet device" like this, with all the persistent stuff collected onto it, especially since it's expected to be running all the time.

The $10 crappy PC is cheap - but one faulty part and it'll be as expensive as the router again. And the router is small, it is quiet (no fan or harddrive), and you'll save enough on your electric bill compared to a whole PC that I really wonder if the PC is worth it at all.

I spent a lot of time working with

[tenchiken]

I spent a lot of time working with SveaSoft's images. In general, if you have a old linksys floating around, it's a pretty good way to go. The time requirements for setting things up is non-trivial. This is especially true if you want to do anything sophisticated, ie, bridging, WDS or strange NAT tricks.

I am surprised CISCO doesn't do their own Linux adaptation for these boxes. I had no idea they were so popular that they actually would consider a different model for them.

Strangly QoS does not work very well with the latest versions from SveaSoft, as well as SveaSoft now locking downloads to a particular MAC address. I also had trouble getting the newer firmware (Talisman) to work cleanly with my box. I ended up buying a D-Link Gamer Wireless router and things just worked well. Having built in 1GBPS ethernet, QoS without the configuration headaches of OpenWRT and Linksys was cool. As with all opensource, it's only free if your time is worthless.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[XorNand]

...as well as SveaSoft now locking downloads to a particular MAC address.

Wouldn't that be a GPL violation?

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[stinerman]

I used the Sveasoft releases until I tried DD-WRT. It is much more stable than Talisman 1.04, and the features like QoS actually work. I suggest you give them a try.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[tenchiken]

In this case, they provide downloads for a lot of the source, but not everything. It's been very very controversial.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[tenchiken]

I actually ended up using the SveaSoft as a wireless bridge to a seperate network (to cut down on broadcasts) to a Linux box (which has a Atheros chipset, but the driver is randomly locking on AMD64 which is a pain in the arse.

In fact, I think a lot of the uses for these WRTG boxes tend to be things like bridges just to deal with crappy linux wireless cards.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[Stupendoussteve]

It's well known they violate GPL. They call their current releases "beta" and don't release them publicly until they're working on the new version (months or years behind). That's how they make money, you have to pay for the "beta".

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[Stupendoussteve]

Umm. I'm confused. Linksys is owned by Cisco... they release firmware for the boxes... how is this not Cisco doing an adaptation?

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[Malor]

Sveasoft is a very bad outfit. They have pulled some incredibly egregious stunts to try to prevent 'their' firmware from being distributed. It is, of course, 95% GPLed code that they have glued together, and assert that they 'own' the result... others have done all the heavy lifting, yet somehow their last 5% is the most important. And their 5% isn't even very good, as you have noticed.

They have issued DMCA takedown notices and gone to completely unscrupulous lengths to get critics and distributors of 'their' firmware shut down and taken off the net, including accusations of hacking to get individual cablemodem accounts shut down.

The simple fact that they're using MAC-address locking on GPLed software should tell you most of what you need to know about their ethics.

Early on in this whole mess, I posted something that was gently critical of their GPL policy, and instantly had my account revoked. Fortunately, they gave me my $20 back, but then I kept digging and found out what sleazebags they really are.

NOT good people. DON'T give them money.

For more info, check the journal of TheIndividual.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[FFFish]

So please, provide a list of alternatives to SveaSoft! Let us n00bs know.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[Malor]

Oh, I didn't bother because it's been mentioned like fifty times in other threads....DD-WRT is probably the best freeware alternative. If you use their firmware, remember to send them some money through PayPal. You don't HAVE to (one of the benefits of free software, after all), but it's a good idea to support projects you use and care about. Sveasoft has made a killing at $20/year/user. If you give DD-WRT the same amount, it'll be used in much better ways... like not trying to put shackles on your wrists to FORCE you to pay the $20. :)

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[monkeyman_67156]

Yeah, Sveasoft isn't the way to go. They're not exactly the nicest people one earth. sending DMCA notices to google? Yeah, that's not cool. Anyway, you should check out the DD-WRT project. http://www.dd-wrt.com/ It has all of the features of Sveasoft's firmware, and more. I've been using this firmware for about 6 months now, I've been VERY impressed with it. It has a great interface and has many fewer bugs than its Sveasoft counterpart.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[ne0n]

bridging is three mouse clicks if you're using DD-WRT. QoS is also about three mouse clicks and some keystrokes. In short, everything is easier with DD-WRT than with Sveasoft's rather weak firmware.
You might want to try it sometime.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[BobPaul]

DD-WRT is my favorite.
OpenWRT is good too, but doesn't come with a GUI interface by default. Both DD-WRT and OpenWRT let you install debian ipk files for software compiled for the WRT. That's how you can get a GUI on OpenWRT...

HyperWRT is also one I've heard of that's supposed to be good. Just do some googling ;)

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[BobPaul]

It started from the Alchemy sources when Sveasoft finally made them available, and then, yes, Brainslayer's been moving towards OpenWRT compatabilitiy. That's one of the project goals, primarily because OpenWRT had that nice set of ipkg repositories. Some packages had problems when using the other kernel, so it was only natural to switch to the OpenWRT one.

It doesn't use the Linksys interface anymore, either. It's now almost entirely free of tables for layout and lets you choose from a number of different interface designs.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[Basje]

I use DD-WRT for this. Tried the sveasoft firmware, but dd-wrt is much more stable and supports WPA on the client.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[GooberToo]

As with all opensource, it's only free if your time is worthless.

As with most people that are clueless about open source, this line is mindlessly repeated. This closed minded statement completely ignores the fact that many people use open source because 1) it's their hobby, 2) they want something to do with their extra time, 3) enjoy doing something the average joe has not (sense of achievement)....so on and so on. For that mindless statement to have any merit is to assume that no one, anywhere, has any type of hobby or spare time and in fact, spends all of their "free time" working.

Since most humans are not like this, and after all, we are talking about something that most do as a hobby activity, can we please stop with this mindless nonsense! Having said that, sure, this type of activity is not for everyone and for many, it would be a waste of time/money. At the same type, chances are high, the people engaged in this type of activity do not fall into the non-hobbiest situation.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[Kadin2048]

Their "business model" is very controversial, but based on everything I've read they don't seem to be technically violating the GPL, because they do (at least now, although they didn't in the past) distribute the source along with the binaries if you have a subscription and pay. Although there were some versions which were distributed without source, supposedly this is not currently the case.

However, and this is the very shady part, if you republish the source -- as is your right to do, under the GPL -- they terminate your account and refuse to give you any future updates. So essentially if you want to redistribute the source, you have to pay for each version of the binaries+source releases. As obnoxious as that may be, it's legitimate based on the letter of the GPL (if arguably not the spirit).

This is based on fairly old information, plus the Wikipedia article, so it could be out of date. If they're not distributing the source with the binaries again (or a written offer for same) when you buy/subscribe to it, then I think they're cleraly in violation.

Frankly they're IMO a completely shady operation, run by individuals who (when they are not power-tripping by banning people from their silly discussion forum) have abused the open source community at every opportunity. Regardless of their compliance in the narrowest sense, they're not an entity that I would ever do business with.

Speaking more generally, does anyone know who wrote the first version of the WRT54G Linux firmware (who originally GPLed it) and holds the copyright? I think the big problem here is that there's nobody who can really enforce the GPL against Sveasoft, and therefore they take their license obligations less than seriously. They've shown no reluctance to be overtly litigious -- e.g., abusing DMCA takedown notices -- and I don't see why they ought not be due for a suit next time they drag their feet in publishing source.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[jcostom]

Until very recently (i.e. prior to the current release), I would never have recommended OpenWrt. As of White Russian RC4, there's a standard web interface. Unfortunately, they forgot to install the nas package by default, so if you'd like to use WPA, you'll have to ipkg update; ipkg install nas. But after that, it works like a champ.

In fact, I like it so much I just changed out the firmware on my parents wrt54g for openwrt and installed an openvpn server. Now, fixing their computers is as easy as Windows/Apple Remote Desktop (they've still got 1 PeeCee running Windoze left).

Love it.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[tenchiken]

I am actually a OS contributor, and have been using the Kernel since 0.95. I hardly consider myself clueless about Open Source.

And yes, I love working with software. I love configuring it, writing it, and ocassionally beating it to a bloody pulp when neccessary.

But my time still has value. Choosing to work on Open Source negates other productive things that I could be doing. It even negates other Open Source projects that I could be working on. Hence it is a question of priorities which are measured once again by values.

OpenSource, as much as Linux enthusiasts want to pretend otherwise is usually harder to maintain at a new software level then other applications. Certainly OpenWRT and some of these other packes are significantly more difficult and time consuming then picking up the latest D-LINK Gamer wireless router.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[Generic Guy]

HyperWRT is also one I've heard of that's supposed to be good.

HyperWRT is designed to be pretty much what Linksys provides, but with a few extra features enabled (why Linksys hides these, I dunno). The main feature which I enjoy is the remote Reboot button, although its pretty stable and I don't need to use it much.

Having an early model of the WRT54GS (the speedboost model, with more RAM), my big concern is how many varations of this hardware have been put on the market. Some flashes are model-dependent... even the 'official' ones from the Linksys site. They even seem to sell these things at Sam's Club of all places. But its impossible to tell *just what revision* you're actually getting until you tear open the packaging.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[BobPaul]

But its impossible to tell *just what revision* you're actually getting until you tear open the packaging.

Model numbers are printed on the box. Linksysinfo and other places have the model number to revision table's on their websites.

Here's the table from the DD-WRT Wiki

I've purchased one of these for myself, and 4 for friends and relatives, and I always make sure I purchase a revision I have compatible firmwares for.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[MemoryAid]

I don't know about you, but I refuse to expend any time unless I am getting paid for it. This requires elaborate advance planning, to ensure all my time is properly contracted, but I firmly believe that life is not worth living for its own sake; it is only worthwhile if I can coerce someone else to pay me to live it.

Major sports figures with advertising contracts are probably the best example of this, as they are paid by advertisers based on their fame. This is essentially being paid for living. Of course, any salaried employee, with an appropriately written contract, can claim the same thing.

For the few periods of my life where I can't manage to find someone to pay me for something, I usually just skip that portion of time. I do this by moving through time to the next contract period. I realize that most people can't do this, but I know some magical trolls that can move me through the fourth dimension in a non-linear path. It goes without saying that I don't fiddle with open-source software.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[GooberToo]

I hardly consider myself clueless about Open Source.

But I didn't say that! It's you perception that I'm questioning, not your commitment to Open Source. Based on your own statement, you support exactly what I said! For you, it is not a trade of between getting paid and not...its strictly a question of where you're spending your hobbiest time; which you call priorities.

Your time only has value if you can do something with it for which someone is willing to pay or trade for. As with most hobbies, people do it with the time they would not normally be paid. Thusly, it costs nothing other than the price to participate; generally time and/or any required equipment.

Two examples:
1) I take off work to work on my hobby. Yes, time is money.

2) I complete my work day and will not be paid more for working longer. I work on my hobby. Time is not money unless I have a second job for which I can be paid.

For these types of hobbiest projects, most people fall into category two, meaning, time != money.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[GooberToo]

But I didn't say that!

That should read, I didn't mean that. I obviously didn't type what I meant to say. Hopefully my follow up clarifies it.

Re:I spent a lot of time working with

[Cylix]

I have to say I'm quite happy with dd-wrt.

I just installed it about 20 minutes ago.

The best feature for me? Set my router to be a wireless client. I now have 4 ethernet ports wired. Can you say sweet?

The smb mount option is nifty too, but I can't think of much to use it for at the moment.

Otherwise, too damned handy for a drop in replacement.

Impressive

[brent_linux]

Linksys continues to impress. They had a bit of false start when they didn't get the GPL Code out there, but I would say they have really been trying to be good since then.

Re-releasing this marked as a Linux device should be commended. Not only are they selling something that they know people have the intent to modify (which is rare in this day and age), but they are also making it noticable that it runs Linux.

I wish more companies would sell things and be ok with people modifying what they paid money for (MS, Sony, Apple, MPAA,...)

Re:Impressive

[Comatose51]

Don't know about the rest of you but they just won themselves a new customer today because of this. I've been looking to get a new router. At least with this, I know I have the free to muck around with my router if it doesn't work as well as I like.

Re:Impressive

[Mr. Flibble]

Use DD-WRT instead of Sevasoft's version. Sevasoft is acting overly paranoid and kicking users off their forums. While Sevasoft should be entitled to payment for their work, their behavior is awful.

Try dd-wrt over sevasoft - version .22 has great QoS (Version .23 is still beta)

Re:Impressive

[DrEldarion]

See, that's funny, because they pissed me off with this move. The WRT54G could regularly be had for $39, whereas this is being sold for $70. They realized that they had something great on their hands, so they killed the old, cheaper model, then put out a more expensive one for enthusiasts.

Re:Impressive

[mrchaotica]

Didn't the WRT54G list for $70 too when it first came out? What makes you think the GL won't retail for significantly less, just like every other electronic product ever made?

Re:Impressive

[DrEldarion]

The current list of prices?

Re:Impressive

[lewp]

It is a brand new product in the eyes of the retailers (who deal in SKUs, not specs or trends). Give it some time. I'm sure they'll fall back to where they were.

Though, honestly, as the owner of two of these little giants, they're only slightly less of a bargain at $70. I wouldn't hesitate to buy more at that price if I had any use for them whatsoever.

Re:Impressive

[zotz]

"Not only are they selling something that they know people have the intent to modify..."

This is not quite accurate.

On my recommendation, I would say ten to twenty of these have been bought so far, perhaps more.

I recommend them because they can be hacked to run Linux. To date, to my knowledge, none have been.

Even mine, which I keep buying, which are specifically to play with, I have never yet gotten around to actually putting something else on.

I always end up having to loan it out (as currently) or sell it to a client because the local stores are out of stock and they need one asap, etc.

So, it is the potential to do something special if needed that has been selling them in my case. I wonder how much this is so in other cases.

Now, will this L model purposely make it easy to put something else on? That would be a welcome move on Linksys' part. And note, my customers will still be buying the L models if they follow my recommendations in case they need the added features in the future. (Depending on price points.)

all the best,

drew
---
http://www.ourmedia.org/node/85937
Tings - a CC BY-SA novel written for nanowrimo 2005
And for you gentle reader

Re:Impressive

[Collin]

because the wrt54g had to compete with the rest of the cut throat wireless router market, which drove its price down. now that the 54GL is a specialty item, it does not need to compete (they have the cost-reduced 54G for that) so the price can remain high.

the magic of the WRT54G was not just that it was flashable to improved firmware. the real magic was that it was flashable, in combination with the fact that the hardware was easily available at numerous retail and online outlets, which also competed with each other.

does anybody really think that the 54GL model is gonna show up in Staples' Sunday newspaper ads with for $40 after rebate? and that we could take that to Circuit City and price match, etc? No way. We'll be lucky if these kind of places even stock it at the list price.

the WRT54G's price has held steady at around $40 after rebates for probably over a year now. Meanwhile, wireless routers from Dlink and Netgear (not to mention the lesser brands) have droped to the $20 range and even free after rebate. One could look at this two ways: either the hacker community was supporting sales of the 54G at the higher price point, justifying its higher price relative to the competition, or Linksys was unable to support lower prices due to the cost of the RAM/flash hardware and thus had to go to the new cost-reduced model to be competitive on the consumer front.

I'm quite certain that we'll be paying higher prices for the 54GL version that we're used to.

Linux and numbers...

[Anonymous Coward]

Mentioning percentage of sales with Linux components sounds odd, since until now, their entire line of 54G/GS routers have been embedded Linux, and flash-capable with 3rd party firmware (at least as far back as I've been messing with them). The real numbers will start to show now that they've split the lines between 54G and 54GL...Guess we'll see. I've got three 54GS units running a WDS network (Talisman code) covering about 4 acres between my family members, and it's great. Planning on adding a 15db gain antenna and another unit hopefully very soon...Freedom to do what you want is golden. Hats off to Linksys for allowing it on their hardware.

Re:Linux and numbers...

[Kadin2048]

Actually I tend to wonder if this wasn't the intent of the move. People seem to be assuming it was because people were buying them to run opensource firmware, but I think that it's because Linksys wants to know whether people are buying it because of Linux. The difference being, they aren't quite sure, and this is how they'll find out.

If the -L version sells well, then one would expect maybe the bean counters will take note and we'll get more Linux-based stuff in the future.

It is slightly obnoxious however that they are charging such a premium for it, though. Hopefully the people who are suggesting that the increase is because to stores it's a new item and thus not deeply discounted are correct, and it will come down closer to where the old (and identical) version was.

Re:GOOD!

[Deekin_Scalesinger]

I wish I had the chutzpah to do it. I'm staring at that unit right now. My big concern with it is if it fails for whatever reason it's probably fried, and I honestly can't afford another one right now. Any cheerful words concerning how easy it was or something like that might convince me to push the red button, but I haven't done it yet...

Re:open

[Jeff DeMaagd]

One thing I've found is that the dedicated hardware firewall like a Linksys could pay for itself in electricity in less than a year over a repurposed desktop PC, assuming the Linksys was $40 USD, the PC was free (technically, it's a sunk cost, so I count it as zero) and that the PC consumed 30W more power than a Linksys.

Other operating systems?

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone know about the possibility of running other operating systems such as OpenBSD on these? Is there any other ports except Linux?

changing the rules

[argoff]

One of the reasons I've always used linux boxes instead of router devices, is because when something isn't right - it's rather easy to log on to the Linux box and run utilities to try and find out what's going on. It also allows allows more flexability on things like source based routing, custom DHCP, custom firewall/masquerading rules, load balancing, and traffic shaping.

This changes the rules, and is very exciting - I can alreay anticipate a whole new generation of hacks coming out that add everything from spam filtering to DNS servers.

Re:changing the rules

[SillyNickName4me]

Both have already been done. OpenWRT basicly allows you to run Debian/mips packages and I had my wrt54g run such services for a while. Issue with mail becomes local storage, first of al the amount of it, and second the fact that its flash rom and can be written a limited number of times only.

For this kind of purpose I'd suggest looking into the Asus W500L instead, which has a USB port so you can connect an external harddisk for example, and runs virtually the same firmware.

Re:changing the rules

[TheRaven64]

If you're willing to spend a bit more, I can thoroughly recommend the PCEngines WRAP boards. I have one with a 266MHz Geode CPU and 64MB of RAM that runs OpenBSD nicely. It has two mini-PCI slots, one of which currently contains an 802.11/a/b/g card and the other will have a hardware crypto card added later for VPN magic.

It's small, silent, and low power (about 5W). There's a serial port on one side for connecting a terminal to and two 100Mbit ethernet ports (some models have three). It boots from a compact flash card, so 512MB of storage space is very cheap (and far more than you need for OpenBSD).

Re:changing the rules

[SillyNickName4me]

Hmm, sounds like a pretty neat device and something I am definitely going to look into.

That said..

It solves the storage issue only with regards to amount of storage, the limited number of writes can become a real issue depending on the actual application, even when using a flash optimized filesystem. If you do something that is going to result in many writes (ie, a bayes filter with auto learning or some form of automatic report handling for a spam filter) you simply do not want to use flash for it.

Re:changing the rules

[TheRaven64]

The best thing to do for that kind of use is probably have the filter write to a RAM drive, and sync this with the Flash filesystem periodically (say, every day). With 64MB or 128MB of RAM there's a bit to play with. Even without that, modern Flash gets around 1,000,000 rewrite cycles - and that's not factoring in wear-leveling). Assuming you updated your database every hour it would last for 114 hours. Since you are probably not going to be deleting the whole thing and then re-writing it - just appending new information - most of the time, it should last a bit longer.

Re:changing the rules

[SillyNickName4me]

The best thing to do for that kind of use is probably have the filter write to a RAM drive, and sync this with the Flash filesystem periodically (say, every day).

Definitely helps.

With 64MB or 128MB of RAM there's a bit to play with.

With 127mb there would be some room to play with indeed, 64 is likely not going to offer the room for this.

When using automated 'learning' suh as for example spam assassin offers, you easily end up with multiple writes for each mail. How many mails you get depends a lot on what you run the mailserver/spam filter for of course, but on the server that runs my personal domains that is already into the hundreds/hour.

Even without that, modern Flash gets around 1,000,000 rewrite cycles - and that's not factoring in wear-leveling). Assuming you updated your database every hour it would last for 114 hours. Since you are probably not going to be deleting the whole thing and then re-writing it - just appending new information - most of the time, it should last a bit longer.

Hmm, how did you get from 1000000 writes to 114 hours with one update every hour? and yes, the filesystem I typically use on such a system does wear leveling (jfs2). For the application of spam filtering I'd still rather have a cheap usb harddisk and not have to worry too much about either amount of storage or number of writes.. For an application that has a more static dataset I'd definitely go for the advantage of not having mechanical parts and the silence of flash memory of course.

Re:changing the rules

[TheRaven64]

Hmm, how did you get from 1000000 writes to 114 hours with one update every hour?

By typing 'hours' when I meant to type 'years'.

the filesystem I typically use on such a system does wear leveling (jfs2)

Modern flash cards do this internally these days. Also, don't forget to take into account the OS disk cache. If a file is modified a lot then it will spend most of its time in RAM and only be sent to the flash when you call sync().

Re:GOOD!

[SilentOne]

I'm running Sveasoft, but I have to say it was easy as hell to do. I also tested doing a revert, and had no problems whatsoever.

Re:open

[aconbere]

Here at my work at an small local ISP we use small Soekris boards running Freebsd. Not only is this hardware rock solid but running a fully featured distro gives us the ability to easily remotely trouble shoot network connectivity issues or firewall rules, or routing tables from here in the office.

We mount them in outdoor enclosures for use as access points or as small deployable routers/firewalls for fiber set ups.

However they are rather pricey (250 - 450 dollars a pop) so still a lot less than comparable cisco hardware, but still too expensive to drop on the porch of a customer.

The question I've had for a while is whether or not I can as a distributor legaly hack a linksys router and drop our own distro on it, and give those out to customers. At a much more affordable price.

I called linksys the other day but the lady I talked to had no idea and never called me back :)

~Anders

I call it BS

[Anonymous Coward]

Most of us know that the WRT54GS had 16MB flash and 32RAM. This made it a powerfull device that could be outfitted with all the addons making it rival a 600$ router from CISCO (mother of Linksys) therefor killing higher product sales.

We also know, that besides the flash and RAM size difference, there was no other difference between the G and GS versions.

Linksys(or Cisco) decided however in the GS v.4 to castrate it to half the RAM and flash and sell it at the same freaking price as previous versions !! So there was no advantage to buy the GS version instead of the G version ( 60$ instead of 100$).

So pple said, screw the GS, let's go for the G. Well well well, not so fast, since they crippled the G v5 to a puny amount of flash and ram : 8M RAM and 2M flash !! that is unusable with linux even if pple figure out a way to somehow flash linux on it !!

So what was linksys's next move ? release a GL version as the old G router and sell it for 20$ more !! Bastards, i tell you.

In conclusion, they're efectively selling 2 devices : the G and the GS with lower specks for both of them, and they are charging us MORE for the G(GL) and the same price for the GS but with HALF the RAM and HALF the flash.

In other words, WE GOT SCRWED and yet the slashdot editor, paints a rather positive spin on this !!

Way to go guys :S

Adi

Re:I call it BS

[periol]

I agree completely. I have no idea what's going on with this Linksys lovefest, but to me this signals a continuation of technology companies and their move towards forced obsolescence.

Convenient strategy - establish market share with good products, then significantly lower the quality of the mass-market device. In the meantime, they'll keep the old product around so the geeks are happy - they'll just have to pay for it.

And yet again, the consumer gets screwed.

(before you go off on some capitalism rant, give me a break. actions like this are always short-sighted. way to go linksys, why innovate a better product when you can just lower your standards and make more money in the short term?)

Re:I call it BS

[Anonymous Coward]

Most of us know that the WRT54GS had 16MB flash and 32RAM.

If you are going to go on a rant like that, at least get your details right, otherwise you look like a blathering fool. The WRT54GS prior to version 4 (what you get now thru retail channels) had 8 meg of flash, 32 meg of ram. The G models had 4 meg flash, and 16 meg of ram. I always wondered why linksys did this, because the GS never did use the extra ram or flash, but I certainly use it on a lot of my installations. The GS models now come with 4 meg of flash, and 16 meg of ram, same as the G always had. I'm not surprised, thier firmware doesn't need the extra hardware, why put it on the boards to begin with ?

I've got about 200 WRT54G and 800 WRT54GS in the field. Have I been screwed by linksys ? Well, if you call putting out a thousand edge devices for well under $100 each being 'screwed', well, then I got screwed, and, please, do it again. this is the kind of screwing we really enjoy. But, before this deployment started, we did have questions about product availability and lifespan, questions we asked directly of linksys. The answers were as expected, the basic non answer one expected. Comparing our options, we chose to accept this risk, and started the deployment about 18 months ago, averaging a little over 50 a month since then, and still going strong. the point is, we did the risk analysis before starting deployment, and accepted the product change cycle risk as a possible point in the future that would break our plan. so far, it's not been a problem, we've been able to keep pace with the product change cycle.

The WRT54G product has allowed me to leverage the manufacturing might of linksys, onto a highly customized platform with our own in house firmware, and deploy a LOT of very capable routers, and a previously unheard of price point, buying for under $100 each. If I had used cisco equipment, and contracted 'cisco experts', the total cost would be well over a million dollars spent today, and, in all honesty, it would never have happened, our budget didn't have that kind of money to spend. I didn't use cisco 'experts' to design the network, I designed it myself. I started with OpenWRT, set up my own package repository on a server in our data center, and built up a custom package set that meets our needs. I've got a thousand routers spread across north america, every one of them religiously checking for firmware updates on a centralized server twice a day. They all have full time vpn connections running, and, the net result is a wide area network that gives all my small locations a full time connection to the corporate network, using a cheap dsl or cable connection from local sources. It's transparent to the offices, nobody at the offices has to fuss with vpn on thier pc's, and, we get wifi thrown in as a bonus. Sales staff LOVE it, they show up at any office, and voila, instant connection over wifi. The hardware cost to date, is just under $100K, and, within the company, I'm a hero for even coming up with the idea, never mind having it implemented and deployed.

The upcoming WRT54GL is good news for me, because it shows that linksys is validating the model we are using. I would have been much happier if the GL had the 8/32 form factor, could care less about the SpeedBooster tho. My supplier has quoted me the GL platform at about $10 less than what my last batch of GS V4.0 cost, so, the price break is gonna be noticed/appreciated here. If the GL was 10 dollars more instead of 10 dollars cheaper, I'd still be happy.

I dont have a lot of patience for folks that bitch about how linksys handles the WRT54 product line. They produce and put into the retail chain a router that's an ideal hardware platform for numerous edge device roles. They leverage thier manufacturing and distribution ability to get that thing to us at a sub $100 price point, even paying full retail. I dont believe for a minute that I'm the only one deploying these things at a tremendous rate to get 'real work' done, at a ver

Re:I call it BS

[Anonymous Coward]

Physically, we dont touch the routers. Standard linksys blue box. Since it's 'in house' theres no need to try hide/disguise branding. The wireless security is just plain old WPA with radius authentication done from a freeradius running on the same box that's hosting router firmware packages. And yes, we are moving folks from 'commute' to 'telecommute', with a lot of that being based on using our own routers for the job.

Re:I call it BS

[SMS_Design]

Impressive-sounding system. Any additional details would be very much enjoyed.

Re:I call it BS

[TheRaven64]

Real geeks build their own anyway. As I said above, I can recommend the PCEngines WRAP board for this purpose. It has a 266MHz AMD Geode (486-class CPU), 64MB of RAM and boots from a CF card. It comes with 1-3 network ports (mine has two) and two Mini-PCI slots for things like WiFi cards and hardware crypto. I've also heard good things about the Soekris boards based on the same CPU, but the WRAP was available cheaper.

If only it wouldn't lockup

[UndyingShadow]

I have a WRT54G and I originally purchased it because I heard it was so hackable. However, I haven't dared to touch the firmware, mostly because the thing likes to explode every few hours. This thing will lockup and refuse all traffic going in or out unless I hard reset it. If many people are connected (10 or 12) it drops connections every 2 to 3 minutes. I understand its a remarkable piece of hardware...if it would just do its job. I'm ashamed to say the D-LINK I had worked much better.

Re:If only it wouldn't lockup

[geekoid]

" This thing will lockup and refuse all traffic going in or out unless I hard reset it. "
That seems like a good reason for trying new firmware.

Re:If only it wouldn't lockup

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you try upgrading to newer Linksys firmware? The "locking up under heavy traffic" problem is fixed by overclocking to clkfreq=216,108 which is also done by newer official firmware..

Re:If only it wouldn't lockup

[digitalchinky]

The V2.2's have some kind of hardware bug that exactly matches what you describe - the latest firmware will overclock the router slightly (by 16MHz) - becomes rock solid stable after that. Most alternate firmware does this automatically now too - though you can do it manually with an nvram / commit thingy.

Re:If only it wouldn't lockup

[jridley]

I had the same problem. Under medium P2P load (several dozen to a hundred or so connections) the WRT54G would get bogged down and eventually stop. I tried several firmwares; 2 or 3 different factory revisions, Sveasoft, HyperWRT. All showed the same problem.

Eventually I gave up and bought a Netgear 614 for $30, and it's been a champ since then. There's no hack community for it, but I only wanted the hacking to make it work. If it works in the first place, then I don't need to hack it (though QoS would be nice...)

Re:If only it wouldn't lockup

[servo335]

I had a similar problem untill i upgraded the firmware. Now it is rock solid!!

Re:If only it wouldn't lockup

[kwalker]

Be careful with this! It's how I bricked my first one. My first WRT54G was a v2.2 and it had the occasional lockup. Before I found out about the 16MHz overclock, I set it on its side (It stands up nicely) and with the extra air flow across the "bottom" of the unit, it ran for weeks on the stock firmware without problems. As soon as I rebooted it after overclocking, it became totally useless. I tried everything I could think of or look up online (I even went as far as sticking it in the freezer and soldering a JTAG header to it) but I couldn't keep it running long enough to undo the overclocking and the JTAG refused to work even though I had three professional EE's check my wiring.

I had to eventually give up and get a new WRT54G. Fortunately, the one I got was also a v2.2 and now it's running OpenWRT and sitting on its side on top of a book case, happily running intrusion detection systems and logging to my NFS server.

Re:If only it wouldn't lockup

[metamatic]

I have to assume you're not talking about the WGR614. I had one of those and it was a piece of crap. I eventually gave it away and got a WRT54GS, because the 614 wouldn't stay up for more than an hour. The WRT54GS has been running continuously for months in spite of a high load from work, P2P, video chat, and a network of 6 machines.

Re:GOOD!

[tenchiken]

Be Afraid. It's good to be cautious when you are talking about possibly bricking your router. At the very least, don't install the latest version. Find out what is stable and solid and go for that.

What do you want to use the router for? If the default features work okay for you, and you don't need things like WDS, routable subnets, QoS, you are better of staying put.

Re:open

[TooMuchToDo]

If you use a 500-600mhz PC with 2 Intel Gigabit NICs (important to use the Intel NICs, as they offload a lot of processing from the CPU to their own board), you can even have your firewall handle gigabit traffic (something a lot of devices are unable to do).

Can't afford it?

[el americano]

There were plenty of 11G routers on sale during Black Friday. You could get a router for $20 or a Router/Client combo for $30. You really need something special if you say you can't afford wireless these days.

On the other hand I can't live without 11a, so I fall into the latter group.

Re:Can't afford it?

[Darby]

Heh, I just got 2 Netgear WGR614 Wireless-G routers, a PCMCIA and a PCI wireless G card for $25 out of pocket with a $40 rebate to send in. Grand total? -$15.00.

My wife is a demon on Fat Wallet ;-)

Re:Can't afford it?

[nolife]

I know each model is different but there are many pieces of shit out there. Cheap or not. I got a AT&T 6800G wireless router for $20 and two AT&T 6500G PCI cards for $10 each on sale at CC one time. The PCI cards are fine for WinXP but the router is a huge POS. It drops connections and hard freezes wired or wireless under any type of load and some applications just do not work, like the headset in for the PS2 (yes I tried DMZ, forwarding ports blah blah, I have other routers that work fine including my current setup with a Smoothwall box with none of that set). Although I myself never attempted to contact AT&T support, others on DSLReports did and first level AT&T support basicially told them to eat shit and don't run network intensive applications like P2P, or game consoles and do not transfer large files with it. I am actually now just using it as a wireless access point and not routing anything with it and it seems to be doing okay. All in all I guess I now have a $20 access point and four port switch which is a good deal for the price but if I would have wanted to use it as an actual router, it would be useless.

Re:Can't afford it?

[FunFactor100]

Are there now good linux drivers for 802.11g wireless network cards? Last month I was unable to find any. The only options I could find was NdisWrapper and some third party pay driver.

Re:Can't afford it?

[AngryUndead]

Madwifi for Atheros chipsets. My tablet (Fujitsu 3500 Stylistic, For Sale!) runs Gentoo Linux and has been using my cheap-as-dirt Blitzz 802.11g card to connect to the router. Works with everything, wpa_supplicant and all. The only thing it won't do is Airsnort which I find highly dissapointing. I've also used the ndis wrappers with a Belkin 54g card. They weren't that hard to install and provided at least the functionality to connect to the wireless network I wanted it to.

Re:Can't afford it?

[JazzCrazed]

Depends on what wifi card you're talking about. My Acer Aspire used to have a Broadcom chip controlling the wifi, for which my only solution was Ndiswrapper (which incidentally worked pretty well, so long as routers weren't encrypted using anything other than WEP). Then I swapped it for an [http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N8 2E16833106219&ATT=Network+Wireless+Ada&CMP=OTC-yah 00TT Intel 2915ABG], which is [http://support.intel.com/support/notebook/sb/CS-0 06408.htm natively supported in Linux just fine].

Re:open

[SquadBoy]

It's not so much that it's Linux as the fact that you can get the source, modify it, and reload it. This allows you to do things with it that you can't with the "mainstream" one. For example I have several of them doing very complex routing with the Freeman firmware that you simply can't do with the defualt firmware. Not to mention if you want to use one as a WiFi bridge.

So any other OSS firmware would do. But you won't be able to hack the firmware on the new model.

While I'm not really happy with the price increase they are still dirt cheap (and I stocked up last weekend) and this way when you buy one you *know* you are getting one with hackable firmware.

All things considered I see this as a win.

Re:open

[benjamindees]

You're assuming I want to use it as a firewall.

Some of these things have miniPCI slots. It could be used for any number of useful things.

I'd like to have a cheap, low-power machine to run an Asterisk gateway personally.

speaking of routers...

[gQuigs]

I've always wanted to install Peer Guardian on my router so I don't have to filter it out on the local PC. Has anyone done this?

Re:speaking of routers...

[Lehk228]

i think it would be easier and more effective/possible to take the IP list out of PG and configure the router to block that rather than trying to make PG act as router software

Percent Linux sales

[domaener]

Linux sales represent a few percentage points of their overall volume, based on the Linksys product director's remarks.

In the article Dhillon claims that they sell "hundreds of thousands per month" units per month. They expect to sell "about 10,000 Linux models per month [..] if lucky.

Let's assume "hundreds of thousands" means somewhere between 200,000 to 400,000 (if it was lower then it wouldn't be hundreds in pluralis, and if it was higher he would probably say "half a million" since that's more impressive marketing speak).

So the Linux sales as a percentage of total sales should be in the region of between 2.5% and 5%. That is pretty impressive and much more than I expected. I guess most of the guys "modding" their routers to run Linux are already Linux users. It is probably safe to assume that the modding Linux community is a subset of the total Linux community. That would in turn imply that the size of the Linux community is bigger than 2.5% - 5% of the total Internet community. Could that really be the case?

Re:Percent Linux sales

[Anubis350]

That would in turn imply that the size of the Linux community is bigger than 2.5% - 5% of the total Internet community.

You forgot that there a lot more routers out there than WRT54Gs (and people with no router)... You need to factor the percentage of internet users with WRT54Gs into you calculations. I expect that it represents less than 20% (less than 10? 5?) of the internet population.

Re:Percent Linux sales

[ZachPruckowski]

That assumes that Linux people buy the same number per person. If some big company buys 5,000 models per month for some reason, then your logic is toast. Similarly, if I understand this right, it only deals with people with wireless, which again, a proportion that may differ in the Windows and Linux communities.

Re:Percent Linux sales

[domaener]

It should be enough to just assume that Linksys buyers are representative to the total Internet community. Isn't that safe to assume?

Re:Percent Linux sales

[cnettel]

Well, as the group of "Linux users wanting to roll their own ROM build on the router" will know that the Linksys model is a good and safe bet, I think it's quite safe to say that this subset of Linux users will be highly overrepresented among the Linksys customers. Also, although I spend most of my time in Windows, I wouldn't think twice to flash a custom ROM image to a Linksys beast if I had access to one and wanted some of the nice functionality. Any attempt to "backtrack" the percentage of Linux users from this data is only slightly more relevant than to do so based on /. httpd logs.

Re:Percent Linux sales

[2008]

No. About half the people on the net use dial-up, and are therefore really unlikely to buy a router. Plus, I think it's a safe bet that wanting your own wireless network correlates with being technically savvy, i.e. people who know what linux is and why you'd want it on a router.

Re:Percent Linux sales

[thogard]

I would say that for every GS I buy for my hacking use, a friend or two will buy one that will always run the defualt firmware. I've found that if I'm doing free tech support that they better buy the exact model I ask them to get because I'm not going to be dealing with lots of different types of hardware for no reason. There are a few people who just don't understand this (Hi Dad!) and get the lowest priced stuff and I refuse to fix it.

I think Linksys has dropped the ball with the L model. They need more ram and maybe more flash. Things are getting tight as it is and my systems in the field running openwrt do run out of ram from time to time.
As someone involved with the Melbourne Wireless Router Project I am recommending people not buy any Linksys routers at this time. We have been attempting to locate other routers (such as ASUS) that I feel will be better in the long run but so far I've had poor luck being able to find something that can be had a reasonable retail price.

WRT54Gv5 -- not just no Linux, it's buggy for now

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a good deal that Linksys is releasing the WRG54GL... I'm glad to hear it.

          Do be careful to not get a WRT54Gv5 though without doing research as to it's current state..as it is, it is NOT just like a WRT54Gv1-4 with stock firmware. It looks the same both physically and in the web page config as the older WRT54G, but it sure doesn't act like it.. Maybe Linksys'll get VXworks running on it properly, but as it is the unit I got had 1.00.0 firmware (never a great sign..) It was unusably buggy.. like, certain config screens randomly "forget" settings, only like 2 out of the 4 wireless cards I have around would even associate with the AP, and the SES (an autoconfig thing to set the channel to a clear one, set a unique SSID, and set a secure WEP or WPA key for you) would just kick in when it feels like, wiping out the SSID and WEP settings already entered into the unit. The "disable SES" checkbox unchecks when going through the config menus and then it's easy to trigger SES by mistake, by either bumping the front button, or hitting the very large "SES" button on the one config page where "Apply" usually is..

          I updated to 1.00.2 (current firmware) and it's got the same issues.. it allowed 1 non-working card to associate, but 1 that did work with 1.00.0 didn't connect with 1.00.2.. I returned it after waiting a bit for a 1.00.3 firmware and have a Netgear access point now.

Impressive - especially as a WRT54G owner

[Mr. Flibble]

I bought the WRT54G ver 1.1 because of its hackability, at the time I was using a Microsoft router (I got it for $10, so I used that) but I bought the Linksys because of the neato factor. Then, I ended up ditching the MS router, because the Linksys with updated firmware is just the bomb. I told all my friends, one, a consultant, began buying WRT54G's for his customers because he could remote SSH into them and open ports etc to maintain their systems. It gave all kinds of flexibility.

I reccomended this model to everyone I knew - we use them at work now, and employees at work have bought them now on my reccomendation. I sent linksys an email thanking them for the GPLed version, and letting Linksys know I was reccomending this model to people.

I was dissapointed with the recent story of the non-linux version, however, with the release of the GL version, I am very impressed by Linksys indeed. Yes, it will probably cost a little more due to the better ram, but hey, I WANT the better ram! (Still seriously considering the flashcard hack...)

For those who care, my router runs:

dd-wrt version .22
WRTBlog
Uses SMB to save information to one of my network machines
Uses SNMP and MRTG (on network machine) to monitor bandwith (on top of bwlog)

These are worthy additions to your WRT. I am considering purchasing another and running kismet on it for wardrivng. :p

-- So, thank you Linksys, for releasing the source, and maintaining the WRT line.

Re:Impressive - especially as a WRT54G owner

[Mr. Flibble]

It's great that Linksys released the source, but it's not because they wanted to. They got caught using GPL code and were forced to open it or deal with lawsuits.

This is true, and I knew it prior to buying - but that does not change the fact that they HAVE released the code, and look at what has happened - if you check out their downloads page there is MORE than just the WRT54G in there, and they have even rolled some of the hacks back into the official releases. The GPL contains the clauses it does so companies do exactly what Linksys has done.

Linksys has probably found that opening the source has been advantageous to them - think about it, the latest version even specifies linux by appending an "L" after the model name.

So whether their intent initally was to obey the GPL or not, they do now, and I will support them. Again, I suspect they have found opening the source has been very benificial to them.

Re:Impressive - especially as a WRT54G owner

[Guspaz]

No, they weren't forced to do anything. They could have simply switched over to vxworks sooner, like all their competitors were doing. Or, they could have released the GPL'd code without all the binary-only drivers that they provide for free, preventing people from actually using the code to do anything.

Linksys obviously looked the situation and decided that they could actually get good press by releasing the GPL code with everything needed to get it going, and made it easy for us.

See, Linksys might only sell a few percent of their routers for eventual linux modding, but think about it. All those luddites asking their techie friends what router to buy, and all the techies (Those few percentage points) are really stoked about their WRT54Gs, so they reccommend them to their luddite friends as good routers. I know I have.

Re:Impressive - especially as a WRT54G owner

[Stupendoussteve]

I got myself a 54G a while ago to cut down on noise and the power stuff, I saw linux and thought it looked pretty cool. Man did I love it. I used Sveasoft for a long while, until I tried out DD-WRT. I've been using DD-WRT without a lockup or reboot since the day v22-final2 came out... I like the static dhcp settings, and the internal dns! )I hate host files, since I change machines around a lot). It's been very good to me, and I would also suggest this to all my friends,in fact, many of them have gotten them, and a few have played with the firmwares.

Heck, even Earthlink uses them, they've released a wrt54g distro that can connect to an earthlink ipv6 gateway, and provides IPv6 addresses for your systems, and all the trimmings.

Re:open

[slashflood]

What for? I mean, do you need Gbit NICs in your router? Do you have a Gbit internet connection?

Management Mode

[byrd77]

I have had three Linksys wireless routers and had pretty good luck. However, the v5 I bought a month ago died in less than two days. Fortunately CompUSA exchanged it and the replacement has been working fine.

One nice feature (which unfortunatly didn't work with mine) is the 'Management Mode' It allows you to put the router in a special mode to re-flash, even if the existing firmware is corrupt. Has a bare-bones web interface to upload the file. Handy.

Too bad mainstream appears to also mean 'cheap, unreliable parts' too...

Re:GOOD!

[Nogami_Saeko]

I used to run sveasoft on my linksys, but after reading more and more about their business practises, I let my account expire, and have now permanently dropped them in favor of the DD-WRT firmware (http://www.dd-wrt.com/).

DD-WRT is just as feature-rich (if not more) than sveasoft, and doesn't play sveasoft's silly games with their firmware source code, the GPL, and banning people on their forums. Sadly I can no longer recommend sveasoft to any of my friends with linksys routers.

N.

I had the very problem you speak of

[Critical_]

It was with clients using Intel's 2915ABG wireless cards. Installing custom firmware and updating the Intel drivers fixed the problem for me. I am currently running Firmware Version : v4.20.9 - HyperWRT 2.1b1+tofu7 on my version 3 WRT54G. I have uptimes of months now without any problems.

Re:I had the very problem you speak of

[shihonage]

I have that very same network card and WRT54G v2.2 . I had terrible problems with all firmwares I tried until I found out a tiny note on Intel's troubleshooting page which explains that they enable, by default, a feature that is NOT COMPATIBLE WITH ANY GODDAMN ROUTER ON EARTH.

If your router (which is ANY GODDAMN ROUTER ON EARTH) has problems, then go ahead and unclick "Default" next to the Power option in your Intel A/B/G network card, and move the slider all the way to the right. I found this stupid shit only AFTER buying two more different routers (Motorola WR-850 and Trendnet 432WRP) which wigged out on me just as WRT54G did.

Someone should sue Intel for this bullshit. Really. I wish Intel was a person so I could punch her in the face.

Re:I had the very problem you speak of

[Achromatic1978]

I'm off to try this on my two Intel 2200BG wireless adapters which are connected to my D-link 624+ (which is a POS - I have been tempted to get a WRT54Gwhatever for a while now) - and which have been plagued by so many issues, both using MS wireless management, and Intel PROSET.

But if you were able to point to a link on Intel's site, that'd be great. If it solved my problems, I'd love you forever. ;D

Re:I had the very problem you speak of

[shihonage]

http://support.intel.com/support/wireless/wlan/sb/ cs-006205.htm This is for my card - 2915 A/B/G. Also, of course, always use the latest drivers.

Re:I had the very problem you speak of

[Achromatic1978]

Yup. 9.0.3.9 - this sounds close to identical to my problem, so, both adapters changed, fingers crossed. Very very muchly appreciated ;D

Arg, mixed copy paste - should have previewed

[Mr. Flibble]

The link I meant to post for dd-wrt (IMO the best firmware for the WRT, mostly because of Sevasofts treatment of customers)

http://www.dd-wrt.com/
dd-wrt

Re:GOOD!

[geekboy642]

I just did the exact same thing, then stepped in. If you can solder worth a darn, even if you screw it up the first time you can still fix it. Read up on JTAG if you're curious as to how.
Actually using this method, you can reload a Microsoft MN-700 game router with OpenWRT, and it turns into quite a good wireless router.

Just my $0.02.

Re:open

[TooMuchToDo]

We're actually using 10Gbps interface cards. We have three peering partners, and our aggregate bandwidth usage is upwards of 7Gbps (each of our providers gives us a 10Gbps handoff, but we don't use the entire 10Gbps from each one).

Could this be a thin client computer?

[G4from128k]

With 4 MB Flash and 16 MB RAM, this box exceeds the basic resources of many early GUI machines. What stops an enterprising hacker from writing a "Word Processor" for this thing? It could render the interface in HTML (perhaps with a bit of Javascript for highly interactive functions) and use something like a GMail account for persistent storage if one doesn't want to let the Linksys read/write to a PC's filesystem.

Re:Could this be a thin client computer?

[2008]

No, thin clients need a screen. A keyboard is nice too.

As for a word processor, I'm sure it could run a light text editor like pico.

Re:Could this be a thin client computer?

[fwitness]

I'm still looking for a good, cheap thin-client solution. Just for myself, so I can put terminals in unused rooms of the house. Most of the ones I've seen for cheap are proprietary or just plain el cheapo.

What I would *really* love, is a thin client that can stream mpegs from my mythbox. I remember reading about some hauppauge thingummy, but it seemed it had to be hacked and wasn't all that stable.

Re:Could this be a thin client computer?

[el_womble]

XBox?

$100 dollars and a mod-chip and you got your self a streaming thin client. Even a has a remote control and plugs into either HiDef or standard TVs!

Re:Could this be a thin client computer?

[elgaard]

I run joe (as jmacs) on mine. Joe is a openWRT package.

Re:Could this be a thin client computer?

[Alioth]

It'd be a thin *server*, not client.
HTML+JavaScript interface would be pretty awful - instead it'd be better to use the X Window System. The X clients (i.e. the programs) can run on the Linksys, and the X server (i.e. where the framebuffer is) on the computer with the keyboard and mouse etc.

It'd be fairly pointless as anything other than a neat hack, though,

I have an old VAX which runs OpenBSD. It has no frame buffer (it doesn't even have a keyboard port - the only way of interacting with the VAX is through a serial terminal or over Ethernet), but GUI programs can be run on it, displaying on my Mac or Linux PC.

Re:Could this be a thin client computer?

[Trelane]

What I would *really* love, is a thin client that can stream mpegs from my mythbox.

What you're probably looking for then is some sort of mini-itx via box, and they can be had for a few hundred dollars, and can be put in more attractive cases than most (even things not intended as cases, as we've seen now and again).

Such is my long-range plan: mini-itx box in a pretty box in the living room for playback/control of the Beefy MythBox in the server room, and various mini-itx stations throughout the house (e.g. kitchen) primarily for music playback.

Re:Could this be a thin client computer?

[fwitness]

Yep. That's the route I'm trying to go. I have a bunch of concerns about it though.

Can I get a mini-itx board that I can use as a frontend in my living room? It has to have a bunch of multimedia features on-board and usuable by linux. Such as:

1) Decent accelerated video, hopefully capable of showing HDTV content (my LCDTV is running VGA at 1280x750 or something)
2) At least 5.1 surround sound AND NO ANNOYING FEEDBACK (I constantly have feedback problems, no matter how expensive my wiring is, or how elaborately I try to avoid interference)
3) Space for an optical drive (I'm hoping to find a nice slot loading slimdrive)
4) USB Support for remote (I.e. ports in the back)
5) Fanless, or damn near silent

Optionally, a fully featured media-reader would complete the set (not just compact flash). I have one a bought at a local chain store for $8 that actually came with linux drivers. It's usb, and works magnificently, but it's ugly to set next to the box.

Oh, and it has to not cost a bajillion dollars. Seems like the actual case is the hardest part, the EPIA Nehemia board looks to fit the bill, and is relatively cheap.

I'm frustrated with my findings thus far, but it seems like new solutions are slowly starting to crop up.

Re:Could this be a thin client computer?

[citabjockey]

Hauppauge Media MVP. This works great as a media client - S-video out to the TV and a remote control. I use it as a client of a MythTV server. The MVP also has a rudementary VNC viewer and a slimp3 client as well when you boot the open source MVPMC code. No keyboard, but for streaming media this is a good solution. On closeout sale a Radio Shack for $40. Checkout http://mvpmc.sourceforge.net/idx.php?pg=main

Re:GOOD!

[Mr. Flibble]

I wish I had the chutzpah to do it. I'm staring at that unit right now. My big concern with it is if it fails for whatever reason it's probably fried, and I honestly can't afford another one right now. Any cheerful words concerning how easy it was or something like that might convince me to push the red button, but I haven't done it yet...

Just do a little reasearch on your specific model, so you know exactly which version you have. Then, install dd-wrt for your model of router. In fact, if you post your exact model of router here I am fairly certain a kindly slashdotter will give you the specific version required. (As long as they are not trolling, heck, if you reply to this I will even tell you what specific version of dd-wrt binary you need) I have flashed a number of WRT's, each with dd-wrt and the directions here are the best:

dd-wrt flashing guide

If you are paranoid make certain to wait the two min suggested after clicking the upload, and then ok buttons. That is it, you are good to go.

IPCop

[ArticleI]

An argueably better and entirely free alternative to Smoothwall is IPCop. Definitely a product worth checking out as there are no "limited" versions and it supports a lot of interesting add ons such as SquidGuard, a midnight commander clone and a time based billing system.

Re:IPCop

[doodleboy]

An argueably better and entirely free alternative to Smoothwall is IPCop. Definitely a product worth checking out as there are no "limited" versions and it supports a lot of interesting add ons such as SquidGuard, a midnight commander clone and a time based billing system.

This is very true, and in fact I'm running ipcop 1.4.x on my home network right now. It's been running great on my old pentium for a couple of years and is amazingly powerful and reliable. It does pretty much everything you could possibly want in a firewall. However:

It makes noise and uses more power than a dedicated router.

It doesn't do wireless.

My wife wants to move her computer to a location that will be very hard to get to with wired ethernet--brick walls, tile floor. So I finally bit the bullet and picked up a Motorola wr850g router from ebay. It has the same memory and chipset as the pre-v5 wrt54g (and is therefore dd-wrt and openwrt compatible) but can be had for less than $30.

Re:IPCop

[jpop32]

It makes noise and uses more power than a dedicated router.

Replace the hard disk with a Compact Flash to IDE adapter, use passive cooler for the CPU and basically you're set. You don't need P4 to run a firewall. Something like VIA's C3 will do. Setup like that doesn't draw much power, so passive PSU cooling becomes an option.

It doesn't do wireless.

Of course it does. The 'blue' interface is for wireless.

Re:IPCop

[doodleboy]

Replace the hard disk with a Compact Flash to IDE adapter, use passive cooler for the CPU and basically you're set. You don't need P4 to run a firewall. Something like VIA's C3 will do. Setup like that doesn't draw much power, so passive PSU cooling becomes an option.

Fine, but after spending your money on mods you'll have something very close to my Motorola wr850g that you can pick up on ebay for less than $30 and then flash with dd-wrt. Ipcop is great, I've been running it on my lan for years, but c'mon.

Of course it does. The 'blue' interface is for wireless.

I stand corrected. WAP support is included as of v.1.4. However you can get an entire linux-compatible router (see above) for about the same price as an access point, so why bother?

Re:IPCop

[jpop32]

Fine, but after spending your money on mods you'll have something very close to my Motorola wr850g that you can pick up on ebay for less than $30 and then flash with dd-wrt.

The major difference is the amount of RAM & CPU power. Sure, you can use dd-wrt for the basic stuff (I use one on my home network). But, could you squeeze L7 traffic shaping on that? How about snort? Or a dozen VPN connections? Squid?

They may be close in capabilities, but with IPCop you have no upper limits on what can you be done with it.

Linksys is ruining their reputation

[jmulvey]

When I purchased the "new" WRT54G, version 5, I expected a router that would at least have better performance than my old, reliable Pentium-II firewall running Windows 2003 and Routing and Remote Services.

Boy was I wrong. Many sites, such as: http://www.tmobile.com/ http://www.realtor.com/ and http://www.gamespot.com/ all had great difficulty loading. It turns out a **LOT** of other people are having the same problem with the Version 5 WRT54G.

My longstanding issue was finally escalated to Linksys Customer Support (you will be escalated to Customer support after dealing with Technical support). At Customer Support, they RMA'd my v5 router, and replaced it with a v4 router. I demanded that they replace it with a v4 router, and I noted that a *LOT* of people on this bulletin board are having the EXACT same problem.

I have literally spent hours trying to solve this problem on the v5 router. As soon as I plugged the v4 router in, my problems were solved!

Of course, Linksys being a company that enjoys wasting their customers' time by not even admitting a problem, you will be forced to pay for shipping charges. No matter that the item is clearly flawed by engineering defects to begin with. I will never, ever, consider buying a Linksys in the future. What a mistake I made thinking they were a premium brand. The fact that they are going to sell a version that finally works as it should, under a different model number and at a higher price, rather than fix the WRT54G Version 5 tells me that they are not interested in providing a quality product. I hope their strategy blows up in their face!

Re:Linksys is ruining their reputation

[puto]

I am sorry you had problem with your linksys router. Sometimes things just are buggy out of the box.

The site you mention had about 3-4 people with a problem. So that does not equate to a lot. Hell, there are only 15-20 posts in the thread, and most are trying to help the same three people.

Although I work for a cell carrier(bandwidth is bandwidth), I have been doing networking consulting since the mid 90s, about 12 years total. And I keep very detailed records of everything. I have installed 87 linksys routers. 43 were wireless. 2 went bad of the wireless and 1 of the wired. At least what my customers reported to me, and the people I deal with are generally vocal when something does not work. All three were RMA'ed without cost.

Your UID is earlier than mine, I must admit I started reading in 97, and cannot remember my old password cuz I left the country and computers for awhile and had to rereg.

I am assuming you are a technical person.

Considering your user id and your post this is what begs the question. Why in gods green earth were you running Windows 2003 on a PII? Seems odd someone would do that, much less resource wise, and cost of the server. Unless you have an MSDN or spare copy lying around?

I mean Linux(this being slashdot and all) would have been a better choice. Unless there was some Windows only feature you needed.

Could you clue a brother in why you were running 2003 on a PII?

Puto

Re:Linksys is ruining their reputation

[jmulvey]

That thread may have had only 3-4 people with the problem, but there are other threads on that board, as well as on www.linksysinfo.org, where people are having the same problem. It appears to be less of a problem for users who are using DSL (in those cases, Linksys recommends tweaking the MTU).

You may have installed 87 Linksys routers in the 12 years you've been keeping records, but how many of them were WRT54G, Version 5? All the prior versions worked great, it's just that Linksys is now selling hobbled routers and introducing a new class of properly-functioning routers for more $$$.

Yes, I'm technical. I hold Cisco CCNA, VMware, Novell CNE (well, for NetWare 5) as well as a lot of Microsoft certifications. I'm a Microsoft Certified Trainer, MCSE, MCDBA, and a few others. So you could say I'm technical. I'm also open minded, so my knee-jerk reaction isn't "Linux" for everything (or Microsoft for that matter).

I work as a consultant for a Microsoft partner, so Microsoft encourages us to get up to speed on their products. I do have MSDN, so the best way for me to get up to speed on situations I frequently encounter is to use the products. I have a lab at home, and so the PII serves many purposes besides functioning as a firewall.

I know a fair bit about Linux as well. I have compiled Kernel, etc... I have no doubt I could get Linux running on the PII, but then I would need another box if I wanted to do Microsoft work, which I enjoy and earn a nice living by doing so.

Re:Linksys is ruining their reputation

[richman555]

Interesting, I have the same slow loading issues with the version 5 router I just purchased. My old Netgear 8 port router runs circles around this thing. I think I will call Linksys for a version 4 router as well!

Re:Linksys is ruining their reputation

[PPGMD]

Could you clue a brother in why you were running 2003 on a PII?

Why not? The computer is a hand me down, most Windows consultants have MSDN subscriptions or the Action Pack, and generally answer surveys and such that net them another copy of copies a year. I have about 5 NFR copies in a drawer at home.

I run ISA Server 2004 using Windows 2003, on a Athlon XP.

I play with Linux and Windows equally.

Re:Linksys is ruining their reputation

[richman555]

There is definitely something wrong with the "new" WRT54G, version 5. When I surf the web, website load very slowly, almost like dialup. I have the same issues you just mentioned and have tried for several weeks to fix it. I've changed MTU settings, changed ports, read every support problem on the Linksys website. I'm surprised that *any* of these version 5 routers work at all!

Re:Linksys is ruining their reputation

[Viper Daimao]

So are they saying this new GL Linux version will not have the problems of the v5? or do I not know what I'm talking about?

Re:Linksys is ruining their reputation

[Trekologer]

Try turing the firewall off on the router. This disabled SPI on it (the inherent network protections of NAT remain). I have yet to see a consumer-grade router do SPI (stateful packet inspection) with zero problems.

Re:open

[Manip]

Just how much do you think electricity costs? .. Let's say the PC did consume 30W more than the Linksys hardwre, well at a very conservative estimate of 11c/kwh (more likely less than this) that means it costs you 0.33c per hour over the PC which means per year it costs you $28.908... $30 $40...

Not to mention the original poster also put across "value add" with using a PC, in that it can do more for you.. That has to have a 'value' associated with it.

Re:GOOD!

[SilentOne]

I'm using their freeware version, but I might check out your suggestion.

Re:GOOD!

[AJWM]

And if you're really paranoid, make sure everything is running on a UPS. Sure, the odds of the power failing just as you're flashing new firmware are low, but the Truly Paranoid don't care about the odds ;-)

Re:open

[Mr. Flibble]

Can you run an MTA on it? An X server? And if you could, why? Doesn't that go against the "let the firewall be the firewall and not host a bunch of other crap on it"?

Fair point, but it is more than a firewall, it is ALSO a router. The stock version does not, for example support SNMP (yes, I know about the problems with SNMP) - and, as another poster pointed out, you can custom script IPTables on it. Heck, you can even run SNORT on it, and who knows, possibly HOGWASH.

But lets say you do use it for a mail server, or apache or something else. It consumes VERY little power compared to a PC. It has (at the very least) a 200 mhz MIPS processor. This is more than enough to compensate for light jobs - why pay the power bill on a large PC when you can have a much smaller device to boot? Have you noticed how much room this thing takes up compared to a PC? It also has no fans - it is silent. It lasts FOREVER if you put it on a UPS supply! :)

If you really wanted a good, cheap firewall, check out Smoothwall. Get a $10 crappy PC .. throw in 2 NE2000 (or similar) ISA based NICs (you've probably thrown them away before .. I have). Then you have a very VERY useful firewall, that DOES a helluva lot more than these little failure prone Linksys devices.

The only failue I have had with one of these so far is that I left the office router on top of one of my CRT's and it started going haywire. I could not figure out why - until I realized being on top of the CRT I was causing it to overheat. The office router runs dd-wrt, and since we have 2 offices, and when the second office phones with problems, instead of running next door, I use SSH. (Sadly, it is usually someone accidentally tripping over the power cord...) :p

And yes, I used to love the Linksys hardware, but now I have a pile of dead ones from my clients and from personal use. Smoothwall is running and -ZERO- failures as of yet. as long as you dont let it overheat (or run something that is going to wear out the ram), I would guess that one of these would be just as reliable - if not moreso - than a smoothwall PC. (Zero moving parts)

Re:open

[ldspartan]

You're seriously running that kind of bandwidth through commodity hardware in a critical environment? That's ballsy, I must say.

Yes,...

[sarge apone]

but does it run Linux?

Re:Yes,...

[sharkey]

In Soviet Russia, WRT54GL runs YOU!

THANK YOU CISCO/LINKSYS

[Anonymous Coward]

I hope someone from Linksys/Cisco reads this forum. The ability to run Linux on it was indeed the #1 reason I bought that wireless router. Yes, I reallize I had no "need" to - but it is an interesting experience being able to ssh to my router.

Linksys - keep up the good philosophy, and I suspect you could become the IBM-PC-like-standard of consumer appliances that anyone's software can run on.

Re:THANK YOU CISCO/LINKSYS

[Yottabyte84]

You're not the only one. I have two WRT54Gs, and I would not have bought them if they weren't easily hackable.

Re:THANK YOU CISCO/LINKSYS

[Splab]

Why ohh WHY!!!! must it run linux? Linux this, linux that - right now Im doing bachelor projekt trying to get TOR running on these babies - and you know what - its bloody hard doing anything advanced in linux when it comes to networking.

Give me an AP running BSD - now that I could use.

Re:THANK YOU CISCO/LINKSYS

[ivan256]

You know, you can get Zyxel routers with equally good hardware that also run linux in the $18-25 price range... You just have to actually know what you're doing to run linux on them (Well, your own linux... They run linux out of the box) instead of installing a script-kiddy friendly installer.

Plus you don't have to deal with the community of Linksys fanboys... which rivals the communities of game console fanboys.

Similar embedded platforms

[this great guy]

I have always wondered why people who buy the WRT54G to run customized firmwares don't show as much interest as in similar embedded platforms, which are in the same price range ($70 to $130), have a similar or superior hardware config [1], and allow a similar level of customization. So why the WRT54G interest you, but not those embedded platforms ?

[1] Actually those platforms even seem more attractive (faster CPU, more RAM, bluetooth, MMC, etc), the only downside is that, of course, they don't provide 5 ethernet ports, but only 1 or 2.

Re:Similar embedded platforms

[ajlitt]

Because, as sexy as the Gumstix is, it's not a router. There is no Ethernet and Wifi in the $99 package. The WRT is very popular for public access points since you can load NoCatAuth, and many others use it because it allows them to have a wireless router customizable beyond what the original manufacturer intended.

That being said, I'd probably rush out and buy a Gumstix if they came out with a Wifi daughtercard. The CF wifi solution is bulkier than I'd like.

Re:Similar embedded platforms

[the_humeister]

As a poor person, I would have to say that the systems you linked to still cost significantly more than the WRT 54G.

Re:Similar embedded platforms

[caseih]

It's a matter of cost. And not just in terms of money. To build a router out of gumstix, you would need to buy the main module, then buy the compact flash module so you can run a compact flash 802.11 card in it. Then you still don't have 5 ports and we're already up to $250 or so. Add to that having to build the OS (cross-compile it). Of course it is at that point a 400 mHZ, expandable machine. But the convenience (even with having to set up custom firmware) of having the linksys box already set up is what most people really want.

Re:Similar embedded platforms

[Anonymous Coward]

You are confused in your math. The gumstix starter platform costs about $100, then for another $150 you can add ethernet and wifi (and you have to go to another vendor to get the wifi card, after you buy the adapter for gumstix). Dont forget, you still need details like a case, power supply, and antennas etc.

The wrt comes 'off the shelf' for about $70 (depending on where you buy it), comes in a nice little case, complete with power supply, 5 ethernet ports, wifi, antennas, and as a bonus, inside the box is a 6' ethernet cable and a nice coaster (cd). If you are going thru enough of them (I have over 1000 in the field), you will never run out of 90 day 'free trials' for an anti virus, every one of those coasters has one of those too.

I use the wrt as an edge device, loaded with my own custom firmware specific to our network. It can go out to any location, and they just plug it in. When it 'wakes up' at the new location, it brings up a vpn link back to head office. Voila, instant access to locations from the arctic down to locations in mexico. It's solid state, not a power hunger computer, and gives me all the flexibility I need in a custom linux edge device.

With the numbers I have in the field, it's important to look at the 'total cost deployed', not just the sticker price on the 'basic item before necessary add-ons'. If I could deploy gumstix at even double the cost of using wrt54, I probably would, but I cant. the reality is, I can put 3 WRT routers into a location for about what it would cost to build up a gumstix with ethernet and wifi, and it still needs an external switch to give multiple ports.

The WRT54 has yet one more fabulous redeeming feature. It's available EVERYWHERE. On more than one occaision, instead of shipping a pre-configured router, i've had somebody run to the local computer store, buy a wrt54, take it back to the office, plug it into a dsl connect and give me remote admin access. 10 minutes later, it's re-flashed, and they have a highly customized router that automatically integrates into the bigger picture corporate network.

Bottom line, gumstix and wrt54 are not similar platforms. gumstix is a hackers toy, meant for hardware hackers that want to do thier own soldering to hook it up to stuff. WRT54 is a complete/finished edge device, ready to go, out of the box, just add firmware.

Re:Similar embedded platforms

[porkThreeWays]

I've worked with gumstix before. You aren't going to get away with an ethernet setup for 130 bucks. Etherstix is 50 bucks and the etherstix compatable gumstix are over 100 bucks themselves. That's for one ethernet jack. For an effective network appliance you generally need 2 ethernet ports minimum.

Whie I love gumstix and use them a lot, 150+ dollars for a gimp network device can't compete with the hacked wrt54g for 70 bucks. Gumstix are more appropiate for other cool things like robots (or as Zoidberg calls them robuts).

Re:open

[slashflood]

Nice try, but this is about a small wireless home router replacement and not a Shasta or something. BTW: 500 MHz are really enough for Gbit traffic, but only for basic routing and not packet mangling - did some tests long ago.

Re:open

[neilyos]

You must be new here. *ducks*

Linux not so good for embedded systems

[Anonymous Coward]

This particular real-world test case tells us that you can get rid of Linux and cut your flash and SDRAM requirements in half. (And vxWorks is pretty bloated by comparison to other RTOSes, at that. Their old platform was bested not by the leanest commercial competitor, but the fattest.)

Even with Wind River's per-unit royalties and upfront charges, Linksys finds it necessary to avoid the "free" OS to reduce cost.

Re:Linux not so good for embedded systems

[metamatic]

This particular real-world test case tells us that you can get rid of Linux and cut your flash and SDRAM requirements in half.

It doesn't tell us that yet. It's too early to tell whether the new WRT54G is as reliable as the old 54G. Reports from some people who've bought one suggest that it is not.

Re:open

[CRC'99]

What we do with these units is to use custom firmware distro based on OpenWRT for our community wireless network. These units act as a captive portal, and when you login with your username and password, you get a defined level of access with that system.

It's all part of the Melbourne Wireless Router Project (MWRP) and is detailed more at:
http://melbourne.wireless.org.au/wiki/?MelbWireles sRouterProject

We currently use it in a number of places, and it can be used in both PC based systems, and the WRT54G APs. This is a great move for us by Linksys.

Re:open

[TooMuchToDo]

Oh god no. The two are mutually exclusive. Yes, we run over 7Gbps, but we're an all Juniper/Cisco/Foundry shop. I was merely pointing out that if you're running a commodity hardware firewall, you might as well spring for the PCI gigabit NICs that do processing on-board.

As a side note, most of our services (DNS, Mail, etc.) are run on commodity hardware, but it's all redundant. Don't knock commodity hardware. Run properly, you take the risk out of it. Kind of like how Google does it.

Re:open

[nuintari]

well, Linux or not the simple fact of the matter is, the linux version ones worked very well without mods, and the version 5 routers SUCK ASS, and I tell everyone to return them immediatly and demand a btter version.

They lock up like mad, buckle when you try to save config changes, refuse to do pppoe properly after a few hours of runtime, god, my list of complainst goes on.

I did not know this, but it sure as fuck explains a lot. I don't care if it runs linux or not, I just want it to run right, and the linux versions do so very well. So, the best reason to get all nutty over this, is because the alternative was a piece of crap.

Re:open

[aconbere]

Yeah, I'm mostly concerned about an EULA that I'm not aware of hiding somewhere and coming out to bite me in the ass. Or even the DMCA getting pulled. Really I'de also like to know what Linksys corporates feeling on this is. Would hate to deploy say 200 and then get wrapped up in a legal tangle, even if we were on the right side of the law.

~Anders

Re:open

[Mr. Flibble]

The question I've had for a while is whether or not I can as a distributor legaly hack a linksys router and drop our own distro on it, and give those out to customers. At a much more affordable price.

I dont see why NOT, once you own the router, you can back over it in your car if you want to. Just dont expect any kind of support from Linksys - but for your hardware dollar savings, the lack of warranty support will likely be worth it.

Re:open

[TooMuchToDo]

Hate to break it to ya chief, but the box I described is actually in production and works like a champ. Using the Intel Express Pro gigabit cards means even at 80-85% capacity, the box only has a load of .5.

Re:GOOD!

[Rebar]

I bought 4 of them (WRT54GS v2.0) and loaded sveasoft alchemy public version on them in order to create a very extended bridged network using wds. The outer two are connected to separate physical networks, and the inner two only have power (no physical network connection) and are situated in weatherproof boxes in the treetops. I am posting this note over them now!

On hindsight, OpenWRT would have been a better choice, but for the minimally-enhanced functionality I was looking for (wds and a shell), sveasoft is dead easy. Yes, you run a risk and void your warranty. But you only go around once, eh?

Make sure your chosen firmware version is known to work on your particular linksys hardware. Here is a good page outlining the differences in Linksys versions. Sveasoft Alchemy doesn't specifically support my version but I found a reference of someone doing it, and it does work for me.

Good luck / happy hacking, and if you mess up, you want to search for the work "debricking" :)

Re:open

[Guspaz]

Seriously. My modded WRT54G and DSL modem are plugged into a UPS, as the only devices. Last time I did a full rundown test, the UPS lasted 6 hours powering my internet connection.

Of course my laptop will only last 2 or 3 hours, but I can plug it into the UPS too when the laptop battery dies. I figure I can get maybe 4 hours total off the one UPS. 6 to 8 hours if I buy the addon battery pack for my UPS (Back-UPS RS 1500)

Re:GOOD!

[Slack3r78]

Agreed. DD-WRT has not only caught up with Sveasoft feature wise, but these days is passing it. I've also found it to be more stable than Sveasoft's firmware - I was having issues with random reboots on Talisman. Not so with any of the v23 betas of DD-WRT.

Re:GOOD!

[digitalchinky]

Much as I like dd-wrt and use it myself, after briefly joining the IRC room listed on their forum pages at dd-wrt, I find out that the goal of the day was to obtain the latest sveasoft source from 'someone on the inside' - this was said in private to me by brainslayer - take it for the little it is worth, since I am nobody - didn't log the chat, and can't prove it either way - Hell, I don't even know if it was the real 'brainslayer' I was typing at. Our conversation started mostly because I was in the sveasoft room making somewhat less than intelligent (light hearted) banter about getting booted just for mentioning competing firmware. (And the fact that maple syrup in the Philippines now contains up to 2 percent real maple syrup, though I digress) - Not so bad that I actually got booted though.

The politics of firmware.... Sigh...

Other routers can run linux...

[doodleboy]

According to the hardware compatibility guide at openwrt.org there are a lot of different routers that have the same chipset and memory as the v4 wrt54g. I found a new in the box Motorola wkt850 networking kit on ebay which also includes the wr850g router and a usb network adapter. If you don't care about the adapter you can find the router alone for as little as $25.

The deals are out there. You just have to know what you're looking for.

Re:Other routers can run linux...

[pcjunky]

I have had openwrt rc4 running on a Motorola WR850G for over a week now. Runs great in client mode. Reverse SMA antenna connector, same Flash and Ram as wrt V4 hardware, price under $50.

About semiconductor failure rates

[thpr]

Too bad mainstream appears to also mean 'cheap, unreliable parts' too...

I can't say I disagree with you, but as I work for a semiconductor manufacturer, I would like to expand on what 'unreliable' means in this case.

Actually, most consumer electronics devices are 'unreliable' in the sense that they experience relatively high failure rates (compared to, say, telecommunications infrastructure devices). This is a result of the (lack of) burn in done before the parts are deployed. Simply stated, it is cheaper to have consumer electronics fail in the field than to burn in all of the parts before-hand. This is not unique to Linksys.

Consumer devices are generally 250 FIT or higher for early failure rate [first year]. A FIT (failure in time) is the ratio of failed devices (in parts per million) to running time (in thousands of power on hours [kpoh])... so 250 FITS translates into 2500 parts per million (ppm) failing after 10 kpoh. That's really reasonable for consumer devices (0.25% failure in the first year). The average failure rate over the life of the consumer semiconductor (probably rated for 100K or 200K poh) is around 100 FITS.

As a side note, telecommunications devices are generally a higher standard, with early failure rate below 65 FIT and average failure rate below 25 FIT. The burn-in required to reduce the failure rate (since most of the failures occur early in the lifecycle, stress testing a part early on can trigger many of the early failures) costs a bundle of money, and can add enough expense to a part to eliminate the entire profit margin on a consumer device. Of course, for more important applications (telecom, brake systems in vehicles, medical equipment), higher reliability parts are used.

So yes, 'mainstream' (actually 'low margin and low risk in case of failure') does mean lower quality, but please don't bash the manufacturers too hard for it. Economics forces their hand, and the result is the system that is set up to take the returns, as you experienced.

Re:GOOD!

[digitalchinky]

I've got several versions, I've never had one bricked so bad that it couldn't be fixed by placing a wire from the antenna ground across to pin 16 on the intel flash as the thing is powered on.

Re:open

[Lesrahpem]

Get a $10 crappy PC .. throw in 2 NE2000 (or similar) ISA based NICs (you've probably thrown them away before .. I have). Then you have a very VERY useful firewall, that DOES a helluva lot more than these little failure prone Linksys devices.

You really should not use ISA network cards for this. It might be fine if you're just using your connection for web browsing or e-mail, but if you use it for anything else (like gaming or bittorrent) they'll give you some serious problems. I made that mistake a few times.

Re:open

[jmorris42]

> The question I've had for a while is whether or not I can as a distributor legaly hack a
> linksys router and drop our own distro on it, and give those out to customers.

Depends on which hack you install. Hyperwrt is a modified copy of the Linksys code. While the linux binaries and a lot of the other stuff is licensed under the GPL, you might want to make sure it ALL is. Openwrt on the other hand is plain old linux. No licensing problems there at all.

As for the other reply about a EULA, ignore that guy. You are buying hardware. Hardware IS sold and not licensed. Yes there is software embedded in it, but you are planning on blanking that out before you resell it so that is a moot point. The day a judge says a piece of hardware sold over the counter at Walmart is bound by an unsigned EULA is the day I declare the Revolution to have begun and load up my 'sporting goods'.

Why buy this over a WRT54GS

[caseih]

On buy.com, the WRT54GS is actually cheaper than the WRT54GL, and has more RAM and more flash (4mb and 32 mb respectively). Seems kind of lame that they take the same device that used to sell for $45 and jack the price to $70, just to take advantage of the "linux" thing.

So to anyone looking to buy this router, consider the WRT54GS. With more ram and storage, you can do more things with it. All for about the same price.

Also, avoid Sveasoft at all costs. They are slimy. I still haven't been refunded my money after I canceled my automatically-renewing annual protect, I mean firmware access, fee. They promised they would, but a month later and several unanswered e-mails and I'm still out my $20 bucks. Next week I'll lodge a complaint with paypal.

For the best capabilities, use openwrt. it rocks! I've done so much more with it than I did with sveasoft, thanks to having a small writable partition to place scripts and so forth, instead of just having to use the nvram.

WTF?

[paul248]

So, first they sabotage their $40 WRT54G model by making it impossible to buy a "good" version with any certainty unless you're physically holding the box to check the serial number. I can't buy one online now, because I have no idea if I'll get stuck with a v5. Then they re-release the old model, but with a price tag that's $30 higher? Brilliant.

Why create an unnecessary point of discontinuity in the product line? They should have kept linux on the WRT54G, and called the VxWorks model the "WRT54GSUX".

Re:WTF?

[metamatic]

Why create an unnecessary point of discontinuity in the product line?

So they can sell the new crappy one at a high profit margin, based on the stellar reputation of the old one. If that wasn't the intention, they wouldn't have started selling a completely different product under the same model number, as it creates a support problem for them.

Can you say Com-POOZA?

[Futurepower(R)]

CompUSA had Wireless-G routers and USB, PCMCIA, and PCI wireless receivers for $2.99 each after rebate.

That's pronounced Com-POOZA.

$2.99 is expensive, I thought. These days I expect to get something free after rebate, or actually be paid to take something. *grin*

If ever you don't get a rebate, call them up and use the F word. Fraud. That causes low-paid rebate center employees to quit, and costs the fraudsters money to hire someone else.

Sorry, that's Com-POO-Za

[Futurepower(R)]

Sorry, that's Com-POO-za

Re:Sorry, that's Com-POO-Za

[Achromatic1978]

[Hermione] It's not levi-oh-saaa, it's levi-ohhhhh-sa.

Re:GOOD!

[MadChicken]

I was very hesitant too, until I read of all of the ways you can "unbrick" the box. dd-wrt is sweet.

You forgot one thing.

[kf6auf]

The price on these things has dropped as they halved the RAM and Flash. Basically, they now have two models where they had one: a cheaper version and the one we all know and love, they just gave the name to the cheaper one and added an "L" to make the fancier one sound better than last years model.

WRT54GS models are good, get model up to v3.0

[Infoport]

I have a WRT54GS v3.0, got it on rebate for $30 off. I made sure that I had the right version by using serial number ranges from http://www.linksysinfo.org/modules.php?name=Conten t&pa=showpage&pid=6

The latest GS version v4.0 has half the ram (4 & 16 instead of 8 and 32), but the store had mine and even a few 2.0 models mixed in for those who bothered to check the serial on the outside of the box.

I am running dd-rt v.23 right now, because it is free AND very easy to use, as well as modular (uses ipkg capabilities from openwrt). OpenWRT probably does more but needs more setup. I have been playing with the extra features, checking out all the software people like to use, and enjoying connecting via command line to check and change stuff in addition to browser access.
The G model was also on rebate, for a little less, but again the latest version isnt as good, in fact G version 5.0 doesnt use Linux, and getting a lower model revision required reading a lot of boxes (*or letting the store employees help-- I chased off 3 before I decided to let them help read serials after all)

William

Re:open

[afidel]

I ran a Pentium 133 underclocked without so much as a heatsink, definitly no fans involved. I doubt it used much if any more power then the wrt54g.

Re:open

[mnmn]

I dont always understand why someone would buy something like Linksys, especially the tech-inclined. I have pc-based firewalls at home and work. The home version is a machine that crashes when you exec the HLT instruction. Thus anything above windows 95 dies. I just run knoppix with 'nohlt' parameter. The work version does openbsd with lots of fancy packet filtering and is quite bulletproof.

So why should I spend $70 on lower sized hardware? Because its smaller? Or because its not x86? Or because someone brands it 'firewall'. I'd sooner spend a little more and get a 2600 cisco off ebay and use THAT.

Trickle down economics

[benjamindees]

Not only are the systems you suggest nearly twice the price of the Linksys, in six months the price of the Linksys will be even less. And three years from now, when the current wireless standard goes away to be replaced with another, I can pick up a Linksys for almost nothing and use it for something more useful than filling a trash dump.

Re:GOOD!

[Jett]

I've flashed several with HyperWRT - no problems at all. I've got my signal boosted to about 30% higher. Several of my friends have flashed theirs, never heard of anyone have any problems. I have read of people bricking their WRT54's but those were all "I tried to boost the signal 300%" scenarios. It's like a $50 piece of hardware, go for it!

Re:open

[Jeff DeMaagd]

It is possible I made a mistake in the numbers, but I used 8c/kwh, something I thought I found somewhere as being the average cost of electricity in the US.

Keep in mind that the original poster also suggested that the firewall just be a firewall, security-minded people avoid piling on other tasks onto the firewall simply because that opens up more avenues of attacks.

One thing I will grant is that if the Linksys really is unreliable, then there's the aggravation and time in replacing faulty equipment, though old PCs have that risk too. Personally, I've had no reliability issues with the Linksys, and a Linksys replaced a PC that was having reliability issues.

Re:open

[Breakfast Pants]

You spend it because it is the optimal performance that you need and any perfomance equivalents that you can buy in a PC system will be built on older fab technology and thus produce more waste heat and cost more money in electricity. No to mention they will typically have loud, unreliable fans, etc.

Re:GOOD!

[$FFh]

I still managed to destroy mine. I'm pretty sure the hardware's still good, but I corrupted the CFE on my WRT54GS v3. Does anyone know where I can get it?

Re:open

[SillyNickName4me]

Really I'de also like to know what Linksys corporates feeling on this is.

I'd say this 'new' WRT54GL answers that question somewhat no?

Re:open

[jmorris42]

> If you imagine that the LinkSys firmware code is the ONLY software that is embedded in
> that router,

Yes, I know there is a small stub loader that isn't replaced by openwrt. However since it is licensed in from Broadcom and IS supplied in the GPL download tarball at linksys.com I'd say it is redistributable. And since it isn't in the least modified by replacing the firmware it would be pretty safe to assume the first sale doctrine applies to reselling that seperate and distinct software as it would to reselling the entire Linksys router unmodified, something also permitted by law.

> the Stots Corporation sells a woodworking jig called the TemplateMaster under a license
> agreement that significantly restricts the ways in which you are permitted to use the tool.

While not a lawyer, I have actually heard of that one. It can be used to make almost exact copies of itself, and naturally they consider that copyrightable. Not sure on this point, been a while, but I do believe they protect themselves with a real contract instead of a EULA that isn't worth the paper it is printed on in most states.

> So long as the license/EULA is considered to be part of the sales contract, there is
> practically no right that you cannot waive (excluding, say, statutory warranties and tort
> liability) when you buy a product.

With a contract you are correct. But EULAs are only valid in one state and partially in one other.

Re:open

[SillyNickName4me]

First of all you don't replace the recovery software when flashing the device, alltho in some specific cases you may be using it. The EULA would have to specifically limit this usage to Linksys provided firmware or such to have any effect on this situation whatsoever, and then only in very specific cases.

Second, I'd really think Linksys released this WRT54GL because of it beign illegal to replace the firmware with your own eh? I have heard about companies suing their own customers before, but I doubt one (and especially this one) would be as stupid as to sell a device to their customers for the specific purpose of being able to sue them later.

You may be an IP attorney (or not, who is to say, mr. anonymous), but you obviously lack some common sense and/or understanding of the actual process of hacking this hardware.

IPv6

[gjh]

The lack of IPv6 on consumer routers is the single greatest hurdle to wider IPv6 adoption.

Imagine for a moment if

• 99% of new PCs run Windows XP - which they do
• IPv6 was enabled - which takes one command, but is not the case by default
• over 50% of new personal NAT firewalls run 6to4 to give IPv6 LAN emulation behind your single legal IPv4 address - which is developed by the community for the wrt54g

Suddenly all machines behind all of those users have globally unique IPv6 addresses. The easy P2P access that is suddenly available would revolutionize the Internet and light a fire under IPv6. Sadly there is no immediate profit for the NAT/firewall/router vendors in it, and this firmware change represents a sad step in the wrong direction such that - even if a killer app came out for IPv6 that made this desirable - the possibilty of providing an easy IPv6 upgrade for the average users' NAT frouters is now dissolving.

Re:IPv6

[grozzie2]

You are confused, you view nat as a _bad_ thing, and publicly addressible computers via ipv6 as a _good_ thing. That's fine in theory, but, out here in the real world, the internet is a nasty place, and to put a windows machine into a slot where it is ip accessible from the outside, well, that's just begging for problems.

NAT came about because of a percieved shortage of ipv4 address space, it was a 'kludge' developed as an interim solution prior to wide acceptance of ipv6. The real issue since then, it professionals quickly discovered, nat is a great helper in the security aspects of managing a netowrk. A computer sitting behind a nat has a really good first wall in front of it, assuming it's been issued an ip address in the private non routeable ranges for internal use. Folks can go on and on about all the various means of locking the internet out of your internal network, but, the fastest/simplest/easiest first step, is to make sure the local network is behind a nat, and non routeable private ip is used inside the nat router.

I hear a lot of whining about ipv6 acceptance, or more appropriately, the lack thereof here on /. Most /. junkies seem to think this is some sort of plan by the 'big boys' so they dont have to upgrade major network infrastructure. The reality, most corporate it departments DONT WANT ipv6, the absolute LAST thing they want, is ip addressability on all the computers inside thier network, making them visible to the internet at large. Every time you hear about yet another vulnerability in [insert os/program name here] it's another nail in the coffin for ipv6. If I count up all my computers, test machines, and embedded platforms on the ethernet here in my house, I've got 18 boxes taking ip from the dhcp server. It's all behind a nat, and I only have to put effort into locking down ONE box to protect this network, the internet exposed nat router. I'll be damned if I'm gonna let ipv6 sneak it's way onto this network, and potentially expose all of these boxes to direct attacks from the outside.

The lack of acceptance of ipv6 is not due to lethargy, or a 'dont care' attitude on the part of it sysadmins. It's a definitive choice by most of them, they specifically DO NOT WANT IT. The nat barrier at the network edge device is thier first line of defence, and they want to keep that in the network defence arsenal. After the nat comes a firewall, and after the firewall comes intrusion detection. On many 'paranoid' installations, after the ids, comes 'yet another nat', with honeypots dropped on the first segment, just to keep any penetrators distracted long enough for them to be noticed.

Altho, i must say, i like your premise of 'imagine if 50% of personal systems were ipv6 enabled'. That would give the black hats a superb target rich environment, such that, those of us that prohibit ipv6 on our networks, would become far less appealing targets, making life considerably more fun. We can sit back and read about how all the folks with ipv6 enabled are being subject to daily attacks from all over, while the black hats are ignoring those of us taking steps to make our systems harder to reach. Why bother trying to get in thru locked doors, when there's a whole slew of folks out there with wide open front doors, an absolute invite to 'come on in and join the party'.

Re:IPv6

[petermgreen]

You are confused, you view nat as a _bad_ thing, and publicly addressible computers via ipv6 as a _good_ thing. That's fine in theory, but, out here in the real world, the internet is a nasty place, and to put a windows machine into a slot where it is ip accessible from the outside, well, that's just begging for problems.
being on a public ipv6 addrss is much safer than on a public ipv4 address simply because the hit rate of random attacks is about 16 billion billion times lower. but yes there is still the possibility of targeted attacks (e.g. by a server you connect to) and windows is shitty enough to make running it on a network that is end to end open require care.

but anyway you can have a no incoming connections unless i specify otherwise policy perfectly easilly without having nat.

say for example you wan't to be able to admin all your boxes remotely with ssh. it would seem far more convinaiant to be able to just say "allow ssh from theese ips" once rather than making a mapping for every single machine and trying to memorise which port maps to ssh on which machine.

and besides if someone really wants to get into any nontrivial sized network its probablly not that hard to get a box on the inside.

Re:IPv6

[Anonymous Coward]

but anyway you can have a no incoming connections unless i specify otherwise policy perfectly easilly without having nat.

You can but you (or the manufacturor) has to specify the policy, while NAT does this by it's very nature.

Also worth a mention however, that IPv6 has address space defined for LANs/non-routable nets, so NAT is not IPv4 specific.

and besides if someone really wants to get into any nontrivial sized network its probablly not that hard to get a box on the inside.

strawman, this may be true but it doesn't affect putting layers of security onto the rest of the network and it doesn't have much to do with protocols/routing in use.

Re:IPv6

[evilviper]

You are confused, you view nat as a _bad_ thing, and publicly addressible computers via ipv6 as a _good_ thing. That's fine in theory, but, out here in the real world, the internet is a nasty place, and to put a windows machine into a slot where it is ip accessible from the outside, well, that's just begging for problems.

No, you are the one who is very confused.

NAT provides no protection at all... Just a little obscurity. If you have private addresses behind a NAT (and no firewall/packet filter) you're not protected at all. Some simple tricks, like source-routed packets, will bypass the NAT entirely. Send source routed pings to the broadcast addresses of the private address ranges, and you'll get a nice list of (most of) the computers on that network and what IP address they are using. From there, you have full access right through the NAT. It's becomming more and more common for stacks to drop source-routed packets, and ICMP/pings, but make no mistake, those are certainly not the only way to easily pierce through a NAT.

On the other hand, if you have a stateful firewall, you are very secure. You can use private or public addresses behind that firewall, and you are equally secure either way. For public IPs, you just configure the firewall to not even acknowledge that any of computers/IPs are online, and nobody will be the wiser.

Finally: a NAT without a firewall/packetfilter stands out like a sore thumb when you are scanning addresses. And public IPv6 addresses provide a much greater level of obscurity than NAT possibly can, just due to the huge (unoccupied) address range.

Re:IPv6

[MS-06FZ]

That's great and all... but suppose I did this, set up my firewall to deal with IPv6 and gave all my machines IPv6 addresses...

Then what? I mean, who do I know who's running IPv6 who would connect to me? Is my PC at work running IPv6? Are my family's computers at my parents' house running IPv6? Is my girlfriend's Airport Extreme running IPv6? Would this help me to connect back to my home computer from any of those places?

Granted, the fact that IPv6 doesn't apparently do anything for my personal needs doesn't invalidate its importance... But I've heard all about IPv6 for years, and it's like, great - but what can I actually do with it?

Re:IPv6

[petermgreen]

the figure of 16 billion billion i gave was based on the the assumptions that each customer would get at least a /64 (you can get a /48 without too much trouble) if they use MAC based autoconfig then the probability of a hit is slightly higher but still pretty damn low (the number of possible addresses on one subnet with MAC based autoconfiguration would be many orders of magniture less than the total number of IPv4 addresses un existance).

Re:IPv6

[grozzie2]

Take a good look at the original posters premise, ipv6 to enable peer to peer. p2p isn't going to work very well if you are using policies to filter on addresses, basically back to the same issue, you have to administer it all on the edge box, where you have firewall/nat/whatever.

Since the ultimate use is peer to peer, your ip discovery premise is flawed, the strawman arguement. The p2p machine is BROADCASTING to the p2p network the location where it can be discovered. No random discovery necessary, just join the p2p network and wait for that machine to come and TELL YOU where it can be found.

Re:IPv6

[grozzie2]

And public IPv6 addresses provide a much greater level of obscurity than NAT possibly can, just due to the huge (unoccupied) address range.

The original poster was premised on using ipv6 for peer to peer. That basically invalidates your discovery arguement, no random probes thru address space required. Just join the p2p network, and wait for the machine to tell you where it's located. Ip discovery problem solved.

As for the overall security, you misunderstood the whole concept. Nat is not the only layer involved, it's just one of the layers, providing 'yet another obstacle' to potential intruders.

Network security in general is a concept vastly misunderstood by a lot of people, especially some of the zealots here on /. . Network security is always a compromise between security, and useability, with some form of 'cost of deployment' normally being the factor that drives the level of compromise. I was once standing beside a server with a client, and he was adamant, this server must be ABSOLUTELY secure from penetrations by external attack, and, compromise from within the company as well. I asked him if there were any other qualifications to the statement, and he said no, just that it must be absolutely secure. The solution was trivial, I reached over, and pulled the power plug out of the ups. Voila, a server that's ABSOLUTELY secure from network attack, but, it kinda fails the useability test in that mode.

The other aspect you need to consider, is the value of the data being secured, as well as the 'ability to pay' for that level of security. If you have data with a value of $100K, there's no sense spending a million dollars developing a security plan/system to protect that data. This becomes totally nonsensical when the company holding the data doesn't have a million dollars to spend on securing it. At that point, you need to develop a plan/mechanism that's proportional to the value of the data being secured, and within the budget of the folks paying the cost. Pretty much every real world scenario ends up balancing trade-offs that ultimately become driven by cost, where useability translates into implied cost.

Its also pretty easy to toss around buzzwords when talking about this stuff, especially dealing with folks that have no clue what the buzzwords really mean. SPI is a good example, lots of low end routers these days advertise 'stateful firewall'. That's all fine and dandy, but, they are basically just out of the box implementations, and, there's no real ability to actually set up stateful conditions on them, and even if there was, the vast majority of folks deploying them, dont have a clue how to go about it. But, it hits the buzzword requirements, it says 'stateful' on the box.

When designing the edge connections for a network, useability normally says we must allow _some_ data thru the edge, otherwise it serves no purpose. That precludes aboslute security, which can be gained by simply unplugging the network connection. So, the key then is to build obstacles on the incoming penetration attempts, without creating systems to cumbersome for internal users. In a large installation, firewalls with large blacklists etc, and filtering proxies may well be appropriate, and, it's going to become a full time job just keeping all those things up to date. In a small office of 4 users, all of whom are computer illiterate, its far to cumbersome of a solution, so, compromise between useability and cost needs to happen. The first step is to deploy a solution that stops the _majority_ of outside penetration attempts, yet implies almost no additional steps/cost/learning for the folks on the inside. A nat router is the obvious first step. It keeps the script kiddies out, and lets the employees do thier work without much/any hassle. In a lot of small offices, that's 'good enough' because you look at the value of the data being secured, and, there's not a lot there to even be an appealing target to a black hat with sufficient skills to get thr

Re:IPv6

[evilviper]

The original poster was premised on using ipv6 for peer to peer. That basically invalidates your discovery arguement, no random probes thru address space required. Just join the p2p network, and wait for the machine to tell you where it's located. Ip discovery problem solved.

That's true, but it doesn't change anything.

With public addresses, you can still block all incomming connections with your firewall. If you want to allow a single port through for P2P, you only open one port, whether through NAT or public addresses.

As for the overall security, you misunderstood the whole concept. Nat is not the only layer involved, it's just one of the layers, providing 'yet another obstacle' to potential intruders.

Once again, you are missing the point. NAT provides NO additional security. NONE. Not one bit. If you have your firewall configured so that outside connections can't get through, they won't get through, whether your machines are behind a NAT, or using public addresses. If your firewall isn't configured so that it will stop connections, then those connections will be able to get through to the machines, whether you are using NAT or public addresses. The only thing NAT does is to require a handful of special packets to be sent by the potential intruder, to discover that it is a NAT, and what addresses are active behind that NAT. That's all there is to it, and NATs are very popular, so everyone you are trying to keep out, knows how to get through.

SPI is a good example, lots of low end routers these days advertise 'stateful firewall'. That's all fine and dandy, but, they are basically just out of the box implementations, and, there's no real ability to actually set up stateful conditions on them, and even if there was, the vast majority of folks deploying them, dont have a clue how to go about it.

Yes, low-end routers aren't a good option for even small businesses. Not that there's any reason they should want to use one though... It's trivially easy to configure something like OpenBSD on flash, or a small hard drive, with PF already configured for NAT, IPv6, bandwidth shaping and stateful filtering. Plug it in to some old 33MHz box you've got lying around, and your theoretical small business has a solution even cheaper than a linksys NAT/router.

Enter the second dose of reality, the small office is _most likely_ using a commodity dsl/cable source for data, and it's _highly likely_ that isp already prevents source routing upstream, so, your source routed black hat isn't gonna get there anyways.

*Ahem*
As I very explicitly said, that's just the simplest way to go about it. There are a great many other ways to penetrate a NAT as well.

There are a lot of locations where nat alone would have been suffient a few years ago, but really need better barriers today. The proliferation of open source solutions actually make some of those better solutions as cost effective today as nat alone was 5 years ago.

NAT is never sufficent on it's own. I wouldn't have set-up a home user, even 20 years ago, with a wide-open NAT, lacking any packet filtering. Before stateful firewalls were common, blocking incomming ports 0-1024 was standard procedure, and there's practically never any reason to forego that most basic security step.

And I would like to mention that stateful packet filtering with open source software was quite possible, much longer 5 years ago. I just browsed through the history file of IPF, and it mentions compiling on NetBSD at least by Feb 1995, and FreeBSD just a few months later (that 11+ years ago now) and IPF was a stateful packet filter even back then.

Re:IPv6

[petermgreen]

which is easier?

1: unlock port x incoming to all machines?

2: or give up on dynamic ips so you have fixed addresses on every machine then go to every machine, configure the software to work with a different port then go an create a huge heap of mappings?

3: deploy an application level gateway or a nat that partially understands the application level protocol (e.g. most nats understand active mode ftp) but unless the protocol in question is very well known its likely to need a full pc as the edge box and may not be availible for the protocol you are interested in.

Re:open

[mrchaotica]

As an analogy, it sounds like you'd be doing something similar to a car tuning shop, like Roush -- taking a Mustang, modifying it, and then reselling it. If it's legal for them, I see no reason why it wouldn't be legal for you (although IANAL).

I knew Linksys wouldn't let me down.

[rice_burners_suck]

This is wonderful news. This means I will not have to boycott Linksys after all... I knew I should expect better from such a company all along! Honest!

(Duh, why does /. display my "Preview Comment" thing in this fancy shmancy box now? What was wrong with the old way, where it was simply displayed, followed by the edit field? No, now there's this box and half a screenful of Name, URL, Subject... blah blah blah... The old way was better.)

This is great news..

[cowmix]

A lot of people, including myself, were deploying these units everywhere for all types of business use.

Things were getting a little squeezy because although hacking the unit was legal, not having Linksys officially 'bless' the process meant that at anytime they could change the floor beneath you.. making dramatic changes to the hardware in the next rev.. leaving everyone stranded. That seemed to be the direction Linksys was going in.

This new release of the hardware shows that Linksys is giving an official blessing to the whole proceeding.. I can deploy these things into the wild for myself and my customers with more confidence that this product line has a longer life.

high sales volume

[NanoGriever]

"We sell literally hundreds of thousands per month," Dhillon said.

The guy said they are selling hundreds of thousands per month??? I guess that says a lot about the reliability of these routers nowadays. I'm on my 4th router in 3 years. My 1st one is a linksys that lasted a little more than a year. Then the netgear and SMC both died in less than a year. This is ridiculous. Did they put a "timebomb" in their software or something so that people will just keep coming back?

Re:high sales volume

[pe1chl]

Well the technical lifespan probably is no more than 2 years anyway. Higher speeds, new protocols and other advancements in technology quickly make those routers obsolete.

Re:open

[nacturation]

The question I've had for a while is whether or not I can as a distributor legaly hack a linksys router and drop our own distro on it, and give those out to customers.

It's the same question as whether or not you can buy a Dell system with Windows pre-installed, wipe out Windows, and sell it as your own solution. Of course you can. Just don't use Linksys's name to promote it.

Unfortunately force is present but not obvious.

[sethstorm]

BZZT. Wrong.

There is force that exists, and people are being screwed. When "free to exploit the consumer markets" exist, and the practical choice (in this case, the pre-modifed Linux WRT54G/GS) is modified against the consumer's wishes in a deceptive manner, they are being screwed.

Exploitative economics is not a defense to mess with your customer. The deception by introducing the linux model later (by fully knowing of those who mod this would avoid the "standard" model if the linux one was there first) is further proof.

Re:Unfortunately force is present but not obvious.

[Somegeek]

"There is a force that exists, and people are being screwed."

What force, gravity? Dark Energy?

Does Linksys have some monopoly on the ability to build routers? No, anyone is welcome to start building a competing product at any time for a lesser price. The fact that no one has may be evidence that in fact this is still a very good value. Who are we to say how much is a reasonable profit for Linksys to make off of these routers? What if they have determined that their support costs for the Linux routers are higher than normal and they have raised their prices solely to be able to continue to offer the product? What if the choice was between no Linux version or a version priced $20 more? Did they screw you by giving you the choice of paying the extra money to pay for the item instead of taking away the choice entirely?

You also seem to think that they have some nefarious scheme built into the release dates of the different models. Was there in fact any gap between the availability of the old models and the new ones? Or a significant gap between the release of the new regular and Linux versions, or was that just a misunderstanding in the news reporting? I saw posts in the last Slashdot discussion about this that stated even back then that there was in fact a separate Linux model available, so this is not a new fact. If Linksys wanted to maximize their profits, don't you think that they would've released the higher priced model first?? And even if there was a gap, don't you think that it might have been due to any number of legitimate reasons? Maybe their Art department did the work for one version before the other. Maybe their QA department finished testing one version before the other. Who knows. Who cares.

They released the Linux version, which's all that matters. If you don't want to buy it great; but you're not being screwed by Linksys.

Re:GOOD!

[saleenS281]

more like "the politics of forcing people to pay for gpl'd firmware".

Re:open

[SillyNickName4me]

First of all, "duh." I never suggested that the recovery software was replaced by a flash. I did suggest that the fact that you couldn't replace the recovery software was at least one reason why a EULA might apply.

I did not need the recovery software to flash any of the WRT54Gs I have around, so I don't see how an EULA on it would apply to begin with (tho one can of course use the recovery software to flash the device, someone who is going to do this on a somewhat larger scale is definitely going to open up the device and use a programmer).

I NEVER said that it would be illegal to replace the firmware on the router. However, it could very well be a breach of the sales contract and/or EULA to resell the router to someone else after you've replaced the firmware.

I signed no contract, there was no EULA the box, and I do not need to turn the device on and do anything with the embedded software to flash new firmware on it (sure, as a typical consumer you do use the original firmware for the reflash, but as already said, there are better ways to do that esp. when doing this on a larger scale), so not even a clickthrough license. If you are not going to debate hypothetical terms of an EULA that may or may not exist, I understand, but please excuse me if I am going to laugh at you if a few lines after that you are debating the possible terms of a sales contract or EULA that may or may not exist, and at is very unlikely at best to apply in any way.

And as you jump on the reply button scream "I gotcha!" consider that there's a big difference between Joe eBay selling his router and Joe's Routers eBaying several hundred routers. There is also the potential for a trademark enforcement problem, but proper marketing and labeling can eliminate that issue.

Yep, trademark issues, lack of warranty from Linksys and such are potential issues, both quite solvable but something to think about.

You obviously lack reading comprehension skills, among others (such as spelling).

Ah, very intelligent response to someone calling you clueless indeed.

I comprehend the actual process, since I've done it myself. Who is to say that you understand it, "Bart"?

You may have flashed a router, that doesn't mean you understand the process, it just means you can execute it. Did you write your own bootstrap code for the device? or a driver for the flash hardware?

You are right of course that untill the day a court decides so, we have no way to be absolutely sure, but when I go into a shop, buy a box without having to sign any contract, then can open it up, do not find any kind of shrinkwrap license either, take the device out of the box, open it up, and connect it to my flash programmer and flash new firmware to it, I see no way for Linksys or any of their suppliers to have any kind of case against me, regardless of if I am going to resell the device after that.

Who may have a case with me are my local equivalent to the FCC due to radio interference caused by modifications to the radio settings.

Re:open

[mrchaotica]

You know, anytime I hear about one of these kinds of projects, I wonder one thing: Why don't you use A/G routers, with clients being served on 2.4GHz, and the backbone running at 5GHz (where there's less interference)? Might that not result in better overall performance (especially since you could use directional antennas for the 5GHz signal)?

Mod Parent Up

[HoneyBunchesOfGoats]

See subject.

have you tried DD-WRT?

[artifex2004]

I looked into it, and the ease of use of it, along with the feature set, (comparison here) pushed me into going ahead and buying a rev3 WRT54GS. Anyway, here is the link.

Re:open

[thogard]

The 5.8 GHz stuff costs far more so its only used in a few places but it is expanding.

Re:WRT54Gv5 -- not just no Linux, it's buggy for n

[TrekCycling]

Weird. I have version 5 and have none of these problems. I didn't even know it didn't run Linux any longer. I know, lazy Slashdot reader, I am.

To everyone recommending DD-WRT

[I Like Pudding]

I just installed it and bricked my v2 router after fooling around with it for a few minutes. Thanks, I needed that.

Re:To everyone recommending DD-WRT

[echomancer]

Quit your whining... You're still on the internet, aren't you?

Re:To everyone recommending DD-WRT

[I Like Pudding]

People: use DD-WRT it rocks
Other People: yeah, what he said
Me: Hmmm, ok.
Me: *reads manual before installing*
Me: *installs*
Me: *has problems with slow wireless*
Me: *adjusts a few settings*
Router: BRRRRRRRICK!
Me: Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck
Me: *attempts de-bricking methods linked to by the manual*
Router: Daisy, Daisy...
Me: I think I'll go warn Slashdot via sarcasm
You: Blah blah you should have first researched a little better blah do not blame the people here for your dead box
Me: Fuck you. Fuck you right in the ear. I should not have to circumnavigate the sum knowledge of the internet like so much Ferdinand Magellan crossed with Neo before flashing a goddamn router. Fuck you.

Re:To everyone recommending DD-WRT

[I Like Pudding]

At reduced capacity.

PS: I sincerely hope a moose rapes you with a pinecone

Re:To everyone recommending DD-WRT

[Monkey]

Fuck man, your responses crack me up. I can really feel your frustration.

Re:To everyone recommending DD-WRT

[I Like Pudding]

Thanks. Remember, good swearing is 50% wording, 50% cadence.

probably not

[alizard]

who's going to buy a consumer box for the explicit purpose of hacking it into something different who isn't a fairly hard-core techie?

This doesn't reflect Linux as a trend, this is something the average Linux user probably won't be doing.

It's the people who look at something like this and ask "Hmmm... just what can I do with a low-powered Linux box that's k3w1?" who buy it.

But even at that, 120K units a year for a premium-priced box for hardware h4xx0rs is amazing.

That's a "thin server"

[Tune]

Apart from memory, a CPU and connectivity, what does a thin client need? Right, you missed keyboard and monitor adapters. Your proposal sounds more like a thin client than a thin server.

Could be interesting nevertheless, but it's just something different. A thin server should rather provide a small (public) HTML server, printer, DHCP, NTP, authentification, VPN - the usual stuff. For bittorrent, SAMBA/NFS storage, POP/IMAP or any other meaningful server task, you need ata/scsi periferals.

Asus WL-500G Deluxe

[dimss]

When Linksys started shipping v5, we switched to Asus WL-500G Deluxe. It has 32MB RAM, 2xUSB and (almost) ready-to-use COM-port. The only problem is small flash memory. I had to build a very custom OpenWRT image. Asus WL-500G Deluxe is more engineer-friendly than Linksys.

Re:open

[tehsoul]

what a useless argument. yeah, everybody has a spare pc laying around, just waiting for it to be used as router/fw. ever thought that people might be cheaper off getting an all-in-one solution that

is easier to use

is less bulky

consumes way less power (please, think of the global warming)

Re:GOOD!

[tigersha]

Oh relax, the trick with the screwdriver shorting out the pins of the flash sounds way worse than it is. And it works too.

Re:GOOD!

[Solosoft]

Failing ... yes ... bricking no ... there are many ways to debrick your router including a few cool ways through software and hardware to debrick it. Reading the linked website below has some ideas to fix a briked router. Making it almost impossible to "break" your current router. I have a WRT54Gs v4 and pressing the Cisco button caused it to open up a TFTP mode.

I prefer the dd-wrt firmware because it has the nice web based frontend plus the ablitity like OpenWRT to install extra software and do intresting things.

Here is an Install Page for the router and once you get it going you can really see what it does. It's awsome. You can use the routers web based frontend without even really having to see the backend but it's still there for those who like to tinker.

Install the v23 beta then Head over here to get ipv6 working this is cool cause it works with a popular free ipv6 tunneling provider. It's so easy to get running and once it's up on the router the clients are easy as pie to setup. "modprobe ipv6" (linux) or "ipv6 install" (windows XP) to get it fired up. He.net gives you 18 quintillion IP's so that should be satisfactory for your small to big LAN.

:) but yeah any other little questions just ask and im sure I can help

Solosoft

OpenBSD no, NetBSD maybe

[Sits]

If memory serves, most of these home routers are running on MIPS based hardware. There is no port of OpenBSD to the sbmips platform (yes there is an SGI MIPS port but I doubt it is similar enough for an easy transition). I believe NetBSD has been ported to this platform but I am unsure of whether the supported chipset is the same as that in a home router. There's also the possiblity that there won't be wifi card or ethernet drivers on NetBSD so you would have to reverse engineer those... Personally I'd just stick with Linux but porting a *BSD for full support would be an interesting exercise.

As another poster said, if you want to run OpenBSD on embedded hardware you are better off going for the soekris stuff but you'll pay a LOT more (prices for just the board without case, wifi card or power cable start at $128) than for the shelf consumer stuff (Amazon has a WRT54 for $54.99).

a Linksys locking up? Shocking!

[spywhere]

I've seen Sofa King many dead and defective Linksys wireless routers that you couldn't give me one.
In fact, I have nine Linksys 802.11b routers in my garage -- six of them still in the shrink wrap -- that I'd be willing to give you.

Re:a Linksys locking up? Shocking!

[geminidomino]

Tell me about it. I've got two dead BEFW11S4s and one WAP11. All bought around the same time, and all seem to have some issue, be it overheading or crappy firmware (with no upgrades available) that makes the wireless just die at random and stay dead for the rest of the day, through reboots, power cycles, etc.

Double that with the stupid crippling of "bridging" mode and I decided a long time ago not to take any more risks with Linksys.

Re:GOOD!

[BrainSlayer]

this is simply wrong. i never sayed something like that. but sveasoft is spreading such things around the world in a flaming war. dd-wrt v16 was initialy forked out of alchemy 6.0rc4. but v23 is the first version which is not based on any sveasoft code anymore

Serial Ports

[un1xl0ser]

Now if they would just would wire and finish the serial ports, and add POE ... nobody would ever buy Cisco's entperprise hardware.

WRT54G to WET54GS5

[barik]

This is slightly off-topic, but since the WRT54G is a hackable router, is there any way to make it act like a wireless-ethernet bridge? (Much like the WET54GS5). This way, I could simply purchase one device (the WRT54G) and configure it to act one way or the other.

Re:WRT54G to WET54GS5

[MintyGreen]

I would have to say yes.

"Linux Model"

[erroneus]

I'm glad they have essentially resumed production of the Linux version. It's a good sign that they are concerned with their customers' demands.

But if they are going to make a Linux version, then it's a fairly foregone conclusion that people intend to hack on it. They should, therefore, make it more hack-friendly in the process. Add a CF slot to the device! Mark it up accordingly as I am sure people will buy the heck out of those.

Re: No support for their own flash failures either

[jfoust2]

I've had Linksys's own firmware re-flashing fail for reasons not apparent to me. I know what I'm doing, I've done many of the firmware upgrades, I read the readme, yet I have two VP41 and one SX41 sitting here that were working fine before the firmware upgrade, yet died immediately when I flashed them. Out of warranty, so now I own some bricks. Isn't there some JTAG method of repairing these?

The broadcom reference design

[mstadtler]

All of these units are based on the broadcom "airforce" reference design. Instead of having to purchase a Linksys or ASUS I would actually prefer to just be able to purchase the reference design from broadcom or have some one like gumstix manufacture this reference design "specifically to support Linux hacking". Here is the link to broadcom site http://www.broadcom.com/products/Wireless-LAN/802. 11-Wireless-LAN-Solutions. So someone could partner with a group like OpenWRT and sell them. This should not be to hard to do with the current offerings of cm, like flextronics.

PCEngines Pricing

[Kadin2048]

Just in case anyone else was curious, here is there price list in USD (they are a Swiss outfit):

http://www.pcengines.ch/order1.php?c=4

Short version:
2 LAN / 2 miniPCI / 128MB = $130
3 LAN / 1 miniPCI / 128MB = $136
1 LAN / 2 miniPCI / 64 MB = $115
1 LAN / 2 miniPCI / 128MB = $122

Not bad, actually. Although if you have the space, you can get a surplus 1U rackmount server for not much more than that, as I recently found out.

Re:PCEngines Pricing

[TheRaven64]

Comparing a WARP to a 1U rack is something of an apples to oranges comparison - the WRAP is 6" square and draws 5W of power (a 1U server will draw at least one order of magnitude more). I paid somewhat less than the prices you are quoting for mine. The unit, a decent WiFi mini-PCI card (does 802.11a/b/g, support 2 antennae for a and two for b/g), and a case and PSU cost around $130 (including delivery) - it also came with a 32MB CF card with an evaluation copy of some proprietary firewall OS, but I haven't used it. It's worth shopping around.

Re:open

[Ortega-Starfire]

The revolution has begun; start loading up on your sporting goods.

Or have you forgotten the entire lexmark ink cartridge refilling debacle?

Yeah...Preview from now on...

[JazzCrazed]

OK, I officially mediawiki too much. Please allow me to rephrase:

Then I swapped it for an 2915ABG, which is natively supported in Linux just fine.

Re:Yeah...Preview from now on...

[FunFactor100]

Now if they'd just make a regular PCI version I'd be set.

I'd be wary of seperate 'Linux' products. . .

[JSBiff]

Of the fact that they have split off the 'linux' hackable version from the mainstream consumer model. Linux has always thrived on cheap commodity hardware. That is, Linux is a niche market that integrates well, in a lot of cases, as a subset of a large market, and the large market keeps prices low and products in production for the niche Linux users.

  While I think it's cool that Linksys has at least made the option available, currently, to buy basically the 'older' model that is hackable and runs Linux, I wonder how long this will last? If it's true that the Linux hacker sales only account for a very small percent of the overall sales, will Linksys consider it worthwhile, in the long run, to continue to market the seperate product?

I suppose that depends on a few things - if some companies spring up that use the WRT54GL to create other products for resale to a mainstream market (for example, selling small-office wireless PBX's using Asterix on one of these devices - and I think there might be companies doing things like this), perhaps this secondary market would be large enough to justify the continued production of these units.

This kind of reminds me of the Corel Netwinder. I don't know how many people remember the netwinder. For some reason Corel (you know, the makers of WordPerfect and CorelDraw), in it's history, has experimented with various other businesses, including being a Linux Distro vendor for about 5 minutes (anyone ever try Corel Linux? It was based on Debian, but there was only ever one release that I know of), and before that, they tried creating a small, arm-based Linux computer.

It was a nice design - extremely compact, quite - really it was about the size of most WAPs in it's physical form-factor, and had a very visually pleasing case design. I think Corel eventually split the netwinder off as a seperate company, which I think struggled along until May of 2005 (the current status of netwinder seems to be a little fuzzy to me - based on a google search, it apepars that as recently as May of 2005, there was a company continuing to develop and sell small Linux-based hardware under the Netwinder name).

The netwinder was a very cool device, but unfortunately, I don't think there was enough market for it, as it targetted people who wanted small, relatively cheap, low-end Linux servers and workstations - but alot of that same market just bought intel or amd based commodity hardware (tower servers, rack servers, blade servers, etc). Linux thrives as a being a subset of a large market, not as a seperate niche market.

Re:I'd be wary of seperate 'Linux' products. . .

[lems1]

FYI

When I used to work for CompUSA (yes, and i luvvvvved it), Corel Linux was given away to customers in a nice CD bundle with a cool presentation. I never really installed it, but I might have the disks around... So, they did release the distro. In fact, Xandros bought Corel Linux and created what we now know as Xandros OS.

flash, RAM looks like the cost diff....

[otis wildflower]

... according to the openwrt site, the linksys wrt54g 5.0 comes with half the ram and flash of the 4.0 model (and other prior models). That could explain the cost difference.

Also, the wrt54gs looks more interesting, it has 8mb flash / 32mb ram...

Re:GOOD!

[swv3752]

You must not live on the crappy FL power grid. We regularly get spikes and brownouts. I go through new UPS every 16 months.

Dear Moderator

[I Like Pudding]

Fuck your flamebait. The parent was flamebait. I was flaming him. That should rightly be (+3, Flaming the Asshole Flamebaiter You Myopic Bastards). I am metamodding you into oblivion inside my head.

What about the WRT54GC?

[level_headed_midwest]

Can you put Linux on the WRT54GC? It's the compact version of the WRT54G but I do not think that it currently runs Linux at all (the F/W download page has the GPL Code button all grayed out.) Anybody knows what this model really runs?

Re:open

[CRC'99]

And the free space loss is higher with a higher frequency. So you get less distance for the same amount of power - and it's less efficient to create the same amount of power.

Costs are still the main problem however, as if you want to do anything serious, you need to avoid coax at 5Ghz as the loss is large. This means if you need to put the equipment seperate from the antenna, you'll need to use a 5Ghz waveguide. These are not cheap.

So you want something with radio and antenna built into one - which means something custom made. Custom made = expensive.

Re:open

[Solosoft]

Yeah eh ... who would want to do This on there cheap little router.

Research these things man they do way more then you could imagine. People have hacked frickin Sound or even a SD Card.

Sheesh research before you spew. A 200MHz Linux server that's your Router/Firewall/Ipv6 Gateway and a ton of other cool stuff all in one little box. I don't see why your bitchin.

Re:GOOD!

[geekboy642]

http://www.aixmarseille.com/OpenWRT

You're welcome.

alchemy firmware is now free

[mattma]

The alchemy firmware for the wrt54g is excellent and free. The firmware includes a pptp server as well as other high end functions. We use the pptp server for our edge network here at lightspoke