OpenWrt Forum Archive

Topic: TP Link TL-WDR3500

The content of this topic has been archived between 25 Mar 2018 and 27 Apr 2018. There are no obvious gaps in this topic, but there may still be some posts missing at the end.

drawz wrote:

It's unclear to me where exactly your configuration really stands. I recommend reseting to defaults using failsafe. To do so try the following commands in failsafe mode via telnet:

firstboot

If that doesn't work, then try:

 mtd -r erase rootfs_data

Once you've reset OpenWrt to defaults, then any of the guides linked to above should get you going.

Hi drawz,

Thanks to the commands you gave I was able to reset the router and now I can telnet and ssh to my router!

However, while trying to install luci I am receiving the following error:

root@OpenWrt:~# opkg update
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/ … ckages.gz.
wget: bad address 'downloads.openwrt.org'
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/ … ckages.gz.
wget: bad address 'downloads.openwrt.org'
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/ … ckages.gz.
wget: bad address 'downloads.openwrt.org'
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/ … ckages.gz.
wget: bad address 'downloads.openwrt.org'
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/ … ckages.gz.
wget: bad address 'downloads.openwrt.org'
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/ … ckages.gz.
wget: bad address 'downloads.openwrt.org'
Collected errors:
* opkg_download: Failed to download http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/ … ckages.gz, wget returned 1.
* opkg_download: Failed to download http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/ … ckages.gz, wget returned 1.
* opkg_download: Failed to download http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/ … ckages.gz, wget returned 1.
* opkg_download: Failed to download http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/ … ckages.gz, wget returned 1.
* opkg_download: Failed to download http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/ … ckages.gz, wget returned 1.
* opkg_download: Failed to download http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/ … ckages.gz, wget returned 1.
root@OpenWrt:~# opkg install luci
Unknown package 'luci'.
Collected errors:
* opkg_install_cmd: Cannot install package luci.
root@OpenWrt:~#

Please let me know if you have any solution for the above sad I am so close to installing luci and finally getting the router working all thanks to you!

Please note - I am connecting to the internet using my phone's 3g internet. I connecting my phone as a wireless hotspot, also shared my internet through bluetooth and usb wire as well. All 3 of them didn't work and I received the same error. Please let me know if you have any questions which will help you gain any insight into this.

Thank you so much for your help, Brother! I owe you one! smile

your last paragraph tells the whole story - you need to configure the internet connection (WAN) on your router properly. Since Luci is not up and running, you need to do this through the command line. If you have another router, my suggestion is to again reset to defaults on the WDR3500, then connect the WAN port of the WDR3500 via ethernet to the LAN side of a working router with functional internet connection. Make sure you can ping a known working server (e.g. google.com) to verify that your internet connection is working before trying to install Luci. Then follow the instructions you already tried. Once you get Luci working, please install a version that has Luci built-in so you won't have to go through this again if you ever reset to defaults. 14.07-rc3 and the pending 14.07 both qualify as such.

If you can't get your internet connection working and therefore can't install Luci, I suggest downloading 14.07-rc3 (or 14.07 final, which should be out any day now) to our PC, then use WinSCP or similar to transfer the firmware flash to your router. Then flash that via command line (see the wiki) and you'll have a fully functioning router. WinSCP requires SSH to be enabled.

(Last edited by drawz on 1 Oct 2014, 03:27)

drawz wrote:

your last paragraph tells the whole story - you need to configure the internet connection (WAN) on your router properly. Since Luci is not up and running, you need to do this through the command line. If you have another router, my suggestion is to again reset to defaults on the WDR3500, then connect the WAN port of the WDR3500 via ethernet to the LAN side of a working router with functional internet connection. Make sure you can ping a known working server (e.g. google.com) to verify that your internet connection is working before trying to install Luci. Then follow the instructions you already tried. Once you get Luci working, please install a version that has Luci built-in so you won't have to go through this again if you ever reset to defaults. 14.07-rc3 and the pending 14.07 both qualify as such.

If you can't get your internet connection working and therefore can't install Luci, I suggest downloading 14.07-rc3 (or 14.07 final, which should be out any day now) to our PC, then use WinSCP or similar to transfer the firmware flash to your router. Then flash that via command line (see the wiki) and you'll have a fully functioning router. WinSCP requires SSH to be enabled.

Hi drawz,

So let me understand the connection correctly on my setup. Firstly, a telephone wire does in my ADSL Router which connections to the Internet automatically, then a LAN wire comes out from the ADSL Router to a Wireless Router through which I am connected to the internet. So now what I need to do is, connect a wire to the LAN port of the Wireless Router and the other end to the WAN Port of my WDR3500 Router and then connect WDR3500 to my laptop and try the same commands after resetting my router. Please let me know if this is what I need to try and if you have any questions.

I also wanted to understand, I already installed Barrier Breaker (14.07-rc3) from the link http://downloads.openwrt.org/barrier_br … actory.bin located on site http://wiki.openwrt.org/toh/tp-link/tl-wdr3500. I have installed factory and not sysupgrade. Please let me know if this is wrong. Isn't this the latest version available?

Apologies for my bad english.

Thank you so much!!

Ok, simplify your setup as much as possible. ADSL LAN->ethernet->WDR3500 WAN. Connect laptop to WDR3500 LAN via ethernet. SSH in and try to ping google. If that doesn't work, reset WDR3500 to defaults. You may need to reboot your ADSL modem/router. If you can't ping google from the router command line, downloading luci will never work.

If that doesn't work use WinSCP to transfer 14.07-rc3 sysupgrade. Use command line to sysupgrade with this file.

The wiki has been edited since you started to avoid people running into your problem. So the file you have is probably NOT 14.07-rc3. If it was, you would already have working Luci because it is built-in and enabled by default! Trunk versions, which the wiki previously pointed to, do not include Luci.

drawz wrote:

Ok, simplify your setup as much as possible. ADSL LAN->ethernet->WDR3500 WAN. Connect laptop to WDR3500 LAN via ethernet. SSH in and try to ping google. If that doesn't work, reset WDR3500 to defaults. You may need to reboot your ADSL modem/router. If you can't ping google from the router command line, downloading luci will never work.

If that doesn't work use WinSCP to transfer 14.07-rc3 sysupgrade. Use command line to sysupgrade with this file.

The wiki has been edited since you started to avoid people running into your problem. So the file you have is probably NOT 14.07-rc3. If it was, you would already have working Luci because it is built-in and enabled by default! Trunk versions, which the wiki previously pointed to, do not include Luci.

Hi drawz,

I tried the connection you recommended but it is still given the same error sad

I guess the only way to WinSCP now. Could you please tell me which file exactly should I install using WinSCP and the steps that need to be followed in order to do so. I just want to make sure that I don't screw up anything again.

I can't thank you enough for all this smile

deepaksewani wrote:
drawz wrote:

Ok, simplify your setup as much as possible. ADSL LAN->ethernet->WDR3500 WAN. Connect laptop to WDR3500 LAN via ethernet. SSH in and try to ping google. If that doesn't work, reset WDR3500 to defaults. You may need to reboot your ADSL modem/router. If you can't ping google from the router command line, downloading luci will never work.

If that doesn't work use WinSCP to transfer 14.07-rc3 sysupgrade. Use command line to sysupgrade with this file.

The wiki has been edited since you started to avoid people running into your problem. So the file you have is probably NOT 14.07-rc3. If it was, you would already have working Luci because it is built-in and enabled by default! Trunk versions, which the wiki previously pointed to, do not include Luci.

Hi drawz,

I tried the connection you recommended but it is still given the same error sad

I guess the only way to WinSCP now. Could you please tell me which file exactly should I install using WinSCP and the steps that need to be followed in order to do so. I just want to make sure that I don't screw up anything again.

I can't thank you enough for all this smile

Hi drawz,

Thanks to you, I have successfully installed sysupgrade file and now I am able to access luci without installing anything else.

THANK YOU SO MUCH!

I wanted to know, if there's any easy way to revert back to the original firmware using luci. If there isn't then I'll stick with this smile

Once again thank you so much! You saved my life man!

Hooray! Glad it worked.

You can revert to stock through Luci *IF* if you have a firmware file that does not have a bootloader included by default. Not sure what TP-Link offers for this model. There may also be users on this forum that have already removed the bootloader from the stock firmware. You can of course follow the wiki instructions carefully to trim and flash the stock firmware file yourself from the command line.

To be honest, unless you have a strong reason to go back to stock, OpenWrt is much more stable and feature-filled. It is a little more advanced/complicated, but not that hard to learn for the most important things.

(Last edited by drawz on 1 Oct 2014, 23:51)

I have a WDR3500 and I am trying to install OpenWRT. I have firmware "3.14.3 Build 151104 Rel.46895n" installed and I am currently receiving an error about an invalid version when I try to upload via the web interface.

I have tried to load it via the TFTP method, but while I see the router starting up on 192.168.0.86, I never see it attempt a tftp request.

What can I do?

jsight wrote:

I have a WDR3500 and I am trying to install OpenWRT. I have firmware "3.14.3 Build 151104 Rel.46895n" installed and I am currently receiving an error about an invalid version when I try to upload via the web interface.

Did you use the correct image? Normally there's two, one for upgrading a router that already runs OpenWRT, and one for upgrading a router that still has the "stock" firmware...

jsight wrote:

I have tried to load it via the TFTP method, but while I see the router starting up on 192.168.0.86, I never see it attempt a tftp request.

Note that on https://wiki.openwrt.org/toh/tp-link/tl-wdr3500 it says for "Failsafe mode":

EDIT— THE GUIDE BELOW IS FOR DIFFERENT HARDWARE, THE 3600, not the 3500.

HTH.

Kind regards,

Ralf

ralfbergs wrote:

Did you use the correct image? Normally there's two, one for upgrading a router that already runs OpenWRT, and one for upgrading a router that still has the "stock" firmware...

Of course. smile

ralfbergs wrote:
jsight wrote:

I have tried to load it via the TFTP method, but while I see the router starting up on 192.168.0.86, I never see it attempt a tftp request.

Note that on https://wiki.openwrt.org/toh/tp-link/tl-wdr3500 it says for "Failsafe mode":

EDIT— THE GUIDE BELOW IS FOR DIFFERENT HARDWARE, THE 3600, not the 3500.

HTH.

Yep, it appears that the documentation is simply incorrect and there is no currently working way to move from a current firmware to OpenWRT. sad

jsight wrote:
ralfbergs wrote:

Did you use the correct image? Normally there's two, one for upgrading a router that already runs OpenWRT, and one for upgrading a router that still has the "stock" firmware...

Of course. smile

Did you also rename it to "wdr3500v1_tp_recovery.bin"?

ralfbergs wrote:
jsight wrote:
ralfbergs wrote:

Did you use the correct image? Normally there's two, one for upgrading a router that already runs OpenWRT, and one for upgrading a router that still has the "stock" firmware...

Of course. smile

Did you also rename it to "wdr3500v1_tp_recovery.bin"?

Yes. I also tried a few other names based upon the standard update files from TP-Link. They all fail with an error about versioning.

Trying an outdated TP-Link file also results in a similar error. From what I can tell, the web interface has been updated with some sort of sanity check that is preventing it from working.

jsight wrote:

Trying an outdated TP-Link file also results in a similar error. From what I can tell, the web interface has been updated with some sort of sanity check that is preventing it from working.

Yeah, could be...

Sorry, I've run out of ideas now... Maybe someone else got a clue?

Tplink's newest firmware does a validation check and doesnt allow you to install 3rd party firmware.

richie275 wrote:

Tplink's newest firmware does a validation check and doesnt allow you to install 3rd party firmware.

Do you know if there is any way to downgrade the firmware? I'm guessing not...

Just installed barrier breaker on brand new tl-wdr3500 via firmware upgrade page with no difficulty. So, not sure the statement

"Tplink's newest firmware does a validation check and doesnt allow you to install 3rd party firmware."

is correct. Unless f/w on my new router is not the newest. Here's what the stock firmware reported:
Firmware Version: 3.14.3 Build 150518 Rel.73041n
Hardware Version: WDR3500 v1 00000000

What is the firmware version that does the validation check?

(Last edited by suncup-jd on 21 Jan 2016, 02:02)

I solved the downgrade problem from the US software version TL-WDR4300_V1_151104_US for TP Link wrt4300 to TL-WDR4300_V1_150518
First of all download the open source US version ' TL-WDR4300_V1_151104_US ' that allow you to update other firmware - from the link below.

Download link:
http://we.tl/naw76a7OZk

After that go to the firmware update form the main router window and update this version.
Restart ther update new version depends of your country form the official site.
Success.

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