Utterly amazing!!
I installed the dd-wrt 2022 stable R50500 img. My 2.4G came back at full power but no 5G. 60 is there too. This seems to verify that there is no issue with hardware. 2.4G is fully working detected by my tablet at full signal level.
NG/Duma latest FW all screwed up.
DD-wrt is half mostly working.
Now I just need to get the 5GHz band back up somehow.
Thanks to the last response! Did you ever go back to the NG bin to see if 5G comes back ok there?
I reset in dd-wrt r50500 to factory default / erasing NVRAM. It did not change any. 2.4G remains strong while no 5G.
In iwconfig, wlan0 is the 2.4G, giwifi0 is the 60G :
wlan0 IEEE 802.11 Mode:Master
Retry short limit:7 RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off
Power Management:off
giwifi0 IEEE 802.11 ESSID:off/any
Mode:Managed Access Point: Not-Associated
Retry short limit:7 RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off
Encryption key:off
Power Management:on
Earlier in the latest r53469 FW, 2.4G was not detected, but the 5G and the 60 radio were detected, but apparently the 5G antenna power was not calibrated correctly, only detected the AP at really low power.
So I believe all the radios are there with no HW issue.
Someone please help in debugging dd-wrt bin to restore 5G
I will never ever return to NG/Duma, becouse it is total nightmare requiring me to reset and restore settings from file every 2 - 3 weeks becouse of not responding router - no matter the version of this learning's students development branch family.
I have had no problems with 5GHz on DD-WRT v3.0-r50500 std (10/13/22). The only thing I observe is a little bit slower wake-up of 5GHZ than 2.4GHz. You have two options now: the problem with reseting settings in NV-RAM(erase problem) or your radio hardware chip became really faulty. To diagnose it deeper, please roll back dd-wrt to any version half year older than r50500 and watch the radio behaviour. Of course make the factory settings reset after downgrade again. Next, try again another one, the year older, from r50500 and make the factory settings reset after downgrade again.
Final TIP: Use VANILLA firmware not DD-WRT on WIFI radio. Don't use DFS channels on 5GHz for tests (over 48 channel number). Maybe You have lidar/radar nearby and 5GHZ over 48 channel is not allowed on your location. The router should not power radio on DFS channel to avoid any collision with radar frequencies - there should be blocking algorithm in router software. You can monitor propagated signal in your area by free WIFI Analyzer app on Android phone. You will see how crowded is air nearby and what is really working from your router.
There is no luck rolling back to earlier ddwrt FW. None of the wifi was even on and also have trouble connecting. I roll forward to 1-2023 V51530. It behaved exactly like V51500, 2.4/60 ok, very stable but no 5G. The 5G radio did not seem to be loaded at start up. It did not show up in iwconfig. It was not an interference issue, but that the controller maybe never loaded. Probably still a FW issue. When I switched back to NG/Duma old bin, there is no 2.4G but the 5G radio was detected with temp displayed but outputting very low RF power in the -90dbm range and not stable as the wifi seemed to be rebooting itself every few minutes. At least the ddwrt bin has very stable 2.4G band. I am still scratching my head not convinced that it is a HW issue on any radio, but perhaps the flash portion config pertaining to the 5G is corrupted. I switched back to the original ART in the mtd and nothing changed. Still foggy but probably giving up soon.
Try to force couple of hardware resets by pin-hole on differrent NETDUMA versions. Sometimes they need to erase NVRAM completely when they change FW version and reinit all the NV-RAM chip data , when they do major changes in firmware.
The Hardware pin reset recovery can do magic for You then.
On dd-wrt, I have done factory default/ reset nvram before. No change.
On NG/Duma earlier bins with telnet, I have done flash_erase of the netgear mtd partition, which is a better reset of zeroing all the nvram. This is more reliable than the pin reset button. No change.
On dd-wrt bins, I have tried multiple bins from 10/2022 to 4/2023, all boot up quickly with normal stable 2.4G/60 but no 5G. The 5G Atheros controller was never loaded at startup. There was no wlan section for the 5G. So of course you cannot change that to Vanilla because it was just not there.
The earlier dd-wrt bins did not have wifi on at all and did not boot into ddwrt. The later bins from 5/2023 to 9/2023 also did not load any wifi. The Wifi light never turned on and stuck at that stage and never complete booting up after half an hour.
However early on when all my WiFi lights were constantly blinking at power on stage, the latest r53469 bin completed the boot up into dd-wrt GUI but I remember there was no wireless menu because no wifi was detected. Now the same bin is stuck in loading wifi and never complete bootup.
Also when tftp back into earlier NG/Duma, there is no 2.4G but the 5G is clearly loaded as its temperature is reported in the debug.htm. Low level 5G RF is detected but intermittent. Probably the calibration is not correctly done now. I have verified that there is no issue with the ART. I have pretty much concluded that there is nothing wrong with the HW but definitely it was a FW corruption into the mtd somewhere in the config. I don’t think there is anything wrong with the 5G radio. Everything was fully working right before this FW upgrade. NG / Duma will not spend any time to look at their bin of course. Their suggestion is to buy another router. Hopefully dd-wrt will have a new bin that can fix the 5G loading.
Last remark. After spending 2 weeks on debugging, it is time to move on.
For Netgear XR700 (or R9000 in my case), my best educated guess is some specific codes had not loaded completely, in strict sequential order, before the next ones were executed when first flashing DDWRT version.
This results in its firmware not fully functional after flashing.
The second boot seems to make the router loaded up normally. I provided the step-by-step earlier in this thread.
My R9000 works fine with the following services:
Router: Netgear R9000
Firmware: DD-WRT v3.0-r53130 std (06/29/23)
Mode & Uptime: Gateway running over MONTHS.
Services used:
- Gateway & AP
- Network separation (VLAN): Home, Guest & IoT
- 5GHz (DDWRT- AC/N-Mixed - Wide HT40MHz) (5Ghz & 2.4GHz on Panama domain for flexibility even though i don't live there)
- 2.4GHz (DDWRT- N/G-Mixed - full 20MHz)
- OpenVPN Client
- OpenVPN Server
- QoS (HFSC/SFC) on streaming devices
Since your XR700's 5GHz works fine elsewhere, it does NOT make sense to me at all about your XR700 behavior one bit. IT devices are more logical than humans. I am sure of that. Otherwise, you only lose another 10 minutes of your time! Good luck.
The second boot seems to make the router loaded up normally. I provided the step-by-step earlier in this thread.
Since your XR700's 5GHz works fine elsewhere, it does NOT make sense to me at all about your XR700 behavior one bit. IT devices are more logical than humans. I am sure of that. Otherwise, you only lose another 10 minutes of your time! Good luck.
Already did those steps a week ago when you post them. Resulted in no change in behavior.
Joined: 16 Nov 2015 Posts: 6447 Location: UK, London, just across the river..
Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2023 6:38 Post subject:
yep, as the others also noted..
when flashing to ddwrt (R9000/XR700)
-reset stock, before flash
-use factory to ddwrt build first (.img)
-than on reboot wait...wait long like 10 min...even more dont look at the lights...
-than reboot and wait again....
-than log in and do reset...reboot and wait...
-sometimes R9000 hangs on boot...( i never had an issue like this)
for first flash R9000 i used Kong old build that is relatively smeller..you can check the attachment here (need to be logged in)
-than flash to any other .bin update like 53469 for example...
Those are the steps i usually do...when flashing R9000 from stock…for first time…
I did the same steps for few XR 700 that i flashed for friends, just used older .img from BS,
sadly, cant tell which build i used in the past, just remembered i looked for the smallest, in
order to avoid bad nvram sectors…
when .bin flash you can try to flash it via telnet/ssh..
p.s. edited the last line of my post due to the following post bellow... _________________ Atheros
TP-Link WR740Nv1 ---DD-WRT 55630 WAP
TP-Link WR1043NDv2 -DD-WRT 55723 Gateway/DoT,Forced DNS,Ad-Block,Firewall,x4VLAN,VPN
TP-Link WR1043NDv2 -Gargoyle OS 1.15.x AP,DNS,QoS,Quotas
Qualcomm-Atheros
Netgear XR500 --DD-WRT 55779 Gateway/DoH,Forced DNS,AP Isolation,4VLAN,Ad-Block,Firewall,Vanilla
Netgear R7800 --DD-WRT 55819 Gateway/DoT,AD-Block,Forced DNS,AP&Net Isolation,x3VLAN,Firewall,Vanilla
Netgear R9000 --DD-WRT 55779 Gateway/DoT,AD-Block,AP Isolation,Firewall,Forced DNS,x2VLAN,Vanilla
Broadcom
Netgear R7000 --DD-WRT 55460 Gateway/SmartDNS/DoH,AD-Block,Firewall,Forced DNS,x3VLAN,VPN
NOT USING 5Ghz ANYWHERE
------------------------------------------------------
Stubby DNS over TLS I DNSCrypt v2 by mac913
Last edited by Alozaros on Mon Sep 25, 2023 21:18; edited 2 times in total
if i recall correctly i was advised by Kong to try this way to flash, to recover missing radios...but im not entirely sure,
was it for R7800 or for R9000 lot of time ago..memory is vague
If you were advised directly, there is no evidence in this forum. Perhaps another case where content in DMs and not out in the public eye doesn't serve the community well? Or a case of not making notes or saving content... either or. <sign> _________________ "The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep." - Robert Frost
"I am one of the noticeable ones - notice me" - Dale Frances McKenzie Bozzio
Thank you for all your replies and suggestions. I really appreciated them and I have tried all of them. I am a long time dd-wrt user and I have used some of Kong’s builds in the past. I first started using dd-wrt on my Linksys WRT router when 802.11G was the fastest then. I am familiar with the dd-wrt tools and bins. I have revived my R7800 and my R9000 from FW corruptions before. But this time with the XR700, seems not easy. Even though the XR700 and the R9000 have identical HW, you cannot just flash in a R9000 bin into the XR. You would probably have to change some of the mtd partitions to convert the XR700 ti a R9000, not what I want to do.
As I stated before, I have no issue flashing in from Duma into dd-wrt first using the factory-ddwrt.img and then subsequent ddwrt upgrade with the webupgrade.bin with multiple XR700 builds between 10/2022 to 4/2023 but only get normal stable 2.4G detected and no 5G. However subsequent builds between 5/2023 and 9/2023 they seem to be different. It is stuck at loading the WiFi section and never recover after long time, say half an hour, and does not go into the ddwrt GUI. Rebooting router does not resolve issue. The only way to get out of this is to tftp back the NG bin and reflash back to dd-wrt earlier bin.
When the earlier bin boot up, it didn’t take very long, it goes through the initialization, then load WiFi, lighting up the corresponding LED for the WiFi detected and then loads the USB with the USB LEDs light up. Gui comes up quickly, definitely don’t need 10 mins to wait, may take 2-3 mins to load the GUI on first flash into ddwrt. It is not going back to recheck the missing 5G if the bootup didn’t find it earlier, no matter how long you wait. Yes, I have reset NVRAM using the factory default option in ddwrt upgrade and subsequent reset but did not help in this case on bringing back 5G. There seems to be some issue with the latest WR700 bins not being able to load in completely and recover if it doesn’t find one WiFi, say 5G.
Again 5G is detected with the NG bin now but not stable and very low unusable RF power which is probably not loading the calibration correctly and no 2.4G was detected in NG. But the Atheros 5G controller is definitely there not found in ddwrt. I have already tried everything I know so far. Will be setting this aside until a newer ddwrt bin comes out and report that separately if that doesn’t load.
The only reason I did this FW upgrade was because this is a major Duma 3 upgrade since this router came out and never knew what it would bring.
I tried the new build r53544 (09/28/23).
It behaved the same way, stuck at loading wifi forever, never came about. No response to ping.
Had to reload back into NG/Duma through tftp to recover. Same as previous build.
No debug log since never boot up. Last working bin was r52369 dated 4/20/2023 for this.
While the last post on this thread was of late last year, I'd like to add some new notes upon my successful flashing of a used XR700 (acquired from eBay) with DD-WRT (version r54420 of 12/4/23 for this exercise).
I've seen several users who mentioned that the 5GHz bandwidth somehow failed to work after DD-WRT flashing. That makes little sense to me having known Netgear products over last several years.
So I took extra caution in ensuring both 2.4GHz and 5Ghz work independently first in DumaOS before flashing. Because of this, I noticed that under DumaOS both 5GHz & 2.4Ghz are kinda joined together in one SSID, by default; with 2.4GHz being used as the banner.
In this setting, DumaOS would (my educated guess) automatically shift a host's connection over to 5GHz (or to 2.4Ghz), if and when necessary, in order to maintain an optimal connection by a host device while moving around.
i) This could well mean that unless this default joining of 2.4GHz & 5GHz channels is deselected, saved and tested, prior to flashing DD-WRT, its 5GHz channel may not work properly, or if at all, after flashing. I did not retrace the steps to confirm this issue however. Writing this post for free is enough, methinks.
ii) The other thing I also did was to downgrade XR700 DumaOS f/w back to Netgear first version (V1.0.0.20) prior to flashing DD-WRT. I understand that later versions of DumaOS lock out the router's ability to flash anything other than DumaOS. It has something to do with protection of its own turf!
iii) One more note. I deliberately unhook XR700's WAN connection before flashing it. Then I waited for a good five minutes, after its corresponding lights were lit up, but XR700 still did not show up its GUI on screen. I then forced a power off/on and it came back normal with DD-WRT GUI. Then cruising mode, after that.
Have you tried printing out your nvram parameters?
Do they match the settings you have in your UI?
Code:
nvram show | sort > /tmp/nvram.out
Then sftp/ftp it out of tmp to view on a pc etc.
Also I would connect a serial cable and dump the boot up procedure to see what, if anything, is failing at boot?
Other wise your guessing.
I am no expert but that's what I would try to see if I could see the problem, that's if the 5GHz radio's aren't toasted. _________________ Netgear R7800 PPPoE Main Router
Network IPV4 - Isolated Vlan's with IoT Devices. Unifi AC-Pro x 3 AP's, Router Wi-Fi Disabled. OVPN Server With Paid Commercial Wireguard Client's. Gateway Mode, DNSMasq, Static Leases & DHCP, Pi-Hole DNS & Running Unbound.
No one can build you the bridge on which you, and only you, must cross the river of life!
Otherwise, you only lose another 10 minutes of your time! Good luck.