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

Re:Difference between versions?

[VAXGeek]

0.7

Re:open

[slashflood]

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

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

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.

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]

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

[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

[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: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

[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

[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

[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

[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.

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

[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: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?

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

[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

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

[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.

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.

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.

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: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.

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

[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

[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)

Yes,...

[sarge apone]

but does it run Linux?

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.

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

[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.

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: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

[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

[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" :)

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.

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: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.

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: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?

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

[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: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.

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.

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:Sorry, that's Com-POO-Za

[Achromatic1978]

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

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).

"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: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.

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.

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.