In any case, 4M is not much memory.   It is probably easier to use extroot or to do hardware "surgery" to use 8M flash, rather try to squeeze out from the 4M flash.  Of course, the next issue will be the 32M RAM.

Python is gigantic. Unless you REALLY need it, it's going to make your image very large. I would suggest seeing if you can use Lua to do what you're planning to do with Python. You should be able to and it's a very nice language.

Other than that, the rest of those packages shouldn't affect the image size all that much.

Please could someone give a step-by-step as to how to edit the network settings under "vi /etc/config/network"?
I type the above in and see the list of settings, but how do I actually edit them. It kinda allows me to type over what's there but I can see how to save it or jump out of that section.

BTW I'm a complete novice at this programming/command line stuff!

Thanks
Simon

http://www.unix-manuals.com/tutorials/v … -10-1.html

that is missing the :wq command to write changes and quit

anyway, looks simpler to me access the router with an SCP client (it's already enabled with same ssh credentials) and edit files "visually" from there

(Last edited by nebbia88 on 5 Mar 2012, 22:14)

Thanks!
I'll give it a try

Background:
I just bought a TL-WR703N off Amazon not having a clue it was a Chinese import! I managed to flash using the 'factory' snapshot, eventualy loggin by SSH and there I got stuck...
I just want to use it as a 3g router with my "3" dongle.

I think your question is more openwrt related rather than 703n specific.  You should be able to find a lot of information by googling information regarding openwrt network setting.

You can simply use "Google translate" to translate the words.
And just simply look for "????"(system tools) , then go to ???? (firmware update)

This model officially just for China market, so there is only simplified chinese.
why don't you look for MR3020, it seems a bit better than 703n

(Last edited by johan666 on 6 Mar 2012, 10:57)

hi I just checked the wr703 with case has 36g , I didn't open it, so I can't say whats the weight of the board itself, but I guess it's probably less than half of the total weight.
And it should be possible to run this, if you can fit all you need in the 4MB flash. But you can try building a custom image to see of it's possible before getting a wr703

btw. what are you building? sounds like a RC-Plane or UAV

(Last edited by eleon216 on 6 Mar 2012, 12:35)

Me again

I've been tinkering an did the opkg install luci and it all seemed to go through with no error messages, but when I try to connect using a browser it ..errr... won't!

Wish I'd left it in Chinese now! I don't suppose it's possible to flash it back to the origional firmware?

Better still.... could it be flashed with the MR3020 firmware? That would be cool

Thanks again!

Have you done:
"/etc/init.d/uhttpd enable" and "/etc/init.d/uhttpd start"?
See: http://wiki.openwrt.org/doc/howto/luci.essentials

I hadn't ..oops! I realised not long after I posted.
I'm in to the web interface now
It's working fine as a wireless AP

Next to get it to recognise and work with my 3G dongle. Basically make it do what it was manufactured to do, but not in Chinese! LOL

Any pointers greatfully received ;-)

I try to build an indoor blimp; with the aim to control it through wifi and to embed a webcam and stream the video through UDP.

i think you have a lot to read and try ^^

http://wiki.openwrt.org/doc/recipes/3gdongle

Hi all:
Can you change the wlan txpower on wr703n with openwrt trunk source code?It's seems i have some problems when i try to change it.
I will test it and give more description!

Hi i am newbie and need help.
i just bought a TP link WR703N from china.
i found that my router is not support usb in singapore.
So i try to upgrade the firmware to openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr703n-v1-SN1_5-squashfs-factory.bin with backup original.
After i upgrade firmware and reboot the device.
it is lock with password and it can't connect even using lan cable.
i had try to hold reset buttom and power on. still can't connecct.

please help....

any chance someone could compile a build with LuCi & luci-app-openvpn built in.

Where did you get that firmware ?
The original openwrt trunk is openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr703n-v1-squashfs-factory.bin, dated 29-Feb-2012

Anyway, the initial state is more or less the same.
Make sure your LAN IP is 192.168.1.x, where "x" is greater than 1, with subnet mask 255.255.255.0
Or you can use DHCP.
Normally it doesn't come with webui, so after your 703n bootup, telnet 192.168.1.1

If you press reset buttom during bootup (blue LED still flashing),
then 703n will go to failsafe mode, LED flashing more faster.
then you can telnet to 192.168.1.1 even you forgot the password or blocked yourself.

Take a look to http://openwrt.org for more details about howto setup and install modules to openwrt

@kenneth

follow carefully every step of

http://wiki.openwrt.org/doc/howto/firstlogin

then

http://wiki.openwrt.org/doc/howto/basic.config

First, I used the 'official' bin file on my router. Then, I saw this post, and I ran:
mtd write openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr703n-v1-squashfs-sysupgrade.bin firmware
as indicated on the wiki: http://wiki.openwrt.org/toh/tp-link/tl-wr703n
I waited the and of the command.
But, now I could not connect to my router anymore (telnet or ssh). However, I can ping it.

Any idea? (I'm newbie on openWRT)
Thank you.

Mtd is meant for Broadcom devices afaik. You should use the sysupgrade command for upgrading images, normally you should be able to flash the initial OpenWrt image from the vendor's web interface.

https://dev.openwrt.org/ticket/10959

The problem is that the vendor's web interface is gone when I switch to openWRT for the first time.
It is because I flashed a second time that I could not reach the router anymore.

I have successfully flashed the wr703n with the mtd command.

Have you tried the failsafe approach?  Cycle power, press reset as soon as the blue led starts to flash.  It should start to flash double-quick, and you should be able to telnet into 192.168.1.1 and run "firstboot", reboot, powercycle, telnet in again, set password and configure.

Check the wiki for exact details--I may have misremembered about failsafe.

(Last edited by lizby on 10 Mar 2012, 13:06)

The blue light never flash in my case (when I plug or when I press the reset button for a long time).
Telnet or ssh still hang and finally print connection refused.

This is the page I followed: http://wiki.openwrt.org/doc/howto/generic.failsafe

@Spip:
It seems you use the mtd command flash the openwrt "squashfs" bin,the "squashfs" binary have the failsafe mode.you say you can ping the board,can you post the ping log mesage?
Because the WR703N use the uboot as the bootloader,the uboot now don't reply any ping(icmp echo) message,if you get any ping reply message from the board,it means the linux run ok and mount the filesystem ok.
The author of your flashed firmware say he enable the LUCI,so you can use web browser view the board and have a try?maybe for some code size issue,he disabe the ssh and telnet.my wr703n is not on my side,so i can't test it for you.

If you can't reach the device with telnet or ssh or http, and if the blue light never starts to flash so you can't press reset to enter failsafe mode, then your only remaining option may be to solder in a serial port.

If you do that, note what the wiki says about the fragility of the tx & rx pads--solder to the nearby components instead (and great care is needed with them too).  Be sure that you use a 3.5-volt ttl connection--5-volt may fry the serial-in port, and rs232 levels surely will.

If your uboot is ok, there may be a very brief tftp window if you have a device which is trying to send a firmware update via tftp.  I haven't tried this, but thought there was a brief message via serial about this as uboot was coming up.