Thanks. I have three devices with the same MT7613 5 GHz radio, and I am seeing occasional dropouts on one. Bought them at the same time, serial numbers follow one another rather closely, so maybe one of them just has a bad radio. Hence my interest in getting some more devices with MT7613 in 21.02.
So far, for me the MT7613 radio has been more stable than with earlier mt76 versions. At this point they're still identical between master and 21.02 (2021-05-15).
I downloaded your 21.02 version and used it for a few days and it seems to work and solved my 5 ghz wireless dropping. In vrpatil'ds PR thread on github, someone mentioned an issue with pppoe. My internet doesn't use pppoe, so i can't test.
One thing I did notice is that the MAC address assigned by Vrpatil's PR are not quite the same as the OEM version.
His PR assigns tham as:
LAN xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:41 (label)
WAN xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:41 (label)
2 ghz xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:42 (+1)
5 ghz xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:43 (+2)
and
stock does so as:
LAN xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:41 (label)
WAN xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:42 (+1)
2 ghz xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:41 (label)
5 ghz xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:40 (-1)
It's not a big difference and works okay nonetheless. Not sure if using the same MAC label for LAN and WAN would cause the issues with pppoe.
I don't think that would, and I've had problems with PPPoE myself on 21.02 and an x86_64 box. Then again, on my own router, PPPoE works fine (both are with different ISPs). So I think it's safe to say this is not a device specific issue.
Thanks for checking the MACs, I'll see if I can send in a patch to address that. And I'll shoot in a backport request for this device as a tested-by.
Is it possible to boot into the rescue firmware partition without opening up the router? https://gist.github.com/sandmail32/67d9f5c64a8979a4035278ef320a08a8#file-0001-ramips-add-support-for-tp-link-archer-a6-v3-patch-L45 This says you can only activate TFTP with serial console but does not mention the rescue partition (or if there is one at all).
@frankis I have uploaded a build with the modified addresses. They should now match the OEM layout. Can you install it and report back? Files are at the same location.
Thank you!
@borromini Ok, I took a look but the Archer a6 v3 images seem too small. They are only 3.3 MB in size whereas the C6 one is double that.
Update: well I flashed it against my better judgement and it bricked. Oh well, if anyone else has figured out how to access the recovery page or launch the tftp without soldering pins, pleaes share.
Sorry for that. I will check what went wrong with the build, the configuration might be different but it's just that single DTS patch on top of what was used for the previous build (and 21.02 HEAD).
@frankis There is no need to solder, you can wedge male pins into the holes and ply them underneath the board so they keep themselves in place, then connect a serial cable to them. I do it all the time (I haven't soldered a single thing up till now).
The black bars can often be moved up or down, you can do that in addition to bending the pins on the back of the board so they are kept in place. Make sure not to get short headers though, there's long and short versions apparently.
I've done that in the past too but I figure if I'm going to the trouble of opening it up, I might as well just solder the pins in there permanently. Anyhow, I did open it up and flashed back to stock. I'm going to let this run over the weekend to check to see if the 5g drops to confirm I don't have a hardware issue.
Since I had the serial console open, I did try the obvious things to see if I could activate the TFTP recovery or web recovery pages using the button pushes, but no luck. It seems the only way to access them is through sending key strokes to the serial console as vrpatil indicated.
As for anyone else looking for an image, the snapshot images seems to work okay. Don't use the june 2 images 21.02 of Borromini for the Archer a6 v3 as it will brick your router and the only way to recover is to open it up and access the serial console to activate recovery mode.
Hey guys, there is a broader backport effort going on, with the A6 v3 amongs the devices. See this mailing list post.
Please test those, @ynezz has built 21.02 images for testing.
Is there any sort of formal testing procedure or set of criteria that would be helpful for me to test against? Or is this more of a works-for-me thing? I've got six of these coming Thursday hoping they'll be ideal for "tactical deployments" (i.e. vacation homes our family rents) so I've got an interest in getting support into 21.02.
in terms of testing, focus on the hardware
does it flash
does it boot
does it reboot
ethernet good
wireless good
etc
Got it, appreciate the list, thanks. Will do.
I assume I should go through the "Reporting bugs" process on the website for specific issues, but what would be the most useful way of reporting success? Replying here? Posting on openwrt-devel? Opening a "bug"?
Sorry for all the questions -- I've been a happy user for many years but this is the first time interacting with the project.
You can reply to the specific post for your device with a Tested-by line, e.g.:
Tested-by: First name last name <e-mail address>
Got it, thanks. I'll gin up a "tested-by" DCO to openwrt-devel with my positive results
couple feedback with bleeding edge build been running.
WPA2-EAP doesn't seem to work, getting some packet format error at Radius server.
WPA2+WPA3 has some issue with older devices.
It's recommended not to use 'WPA3 mixed' but set up separate SSIDs for WPA3 and WPA2.
Is there any way to flash the router through the stock admin interface without opening it up? I got an error: "unable to upgrade". I'm trying to flash openwrt-ramips-mt7621-tplink_archer-a6-v3-squashfs-factory.bin.
I attempted to downgrade to the earliest version (Archer A6(US)_V3_200807) but that failed too with error message "failed to upgrade".
I'm currently on v 1.0.6 Build 20201214 rel.75792.
I just flashed four new Archer A6 v3 (US) units yesterday with the firmware from Petr Štetiar here:
It appears the factory firmware is picky about your web browser and the web interface can fail in weird ways; ultimately I had to use a recent version of Chromium instead of Firefox, but I was able to flash openwrt-21.02-snapshot-r0-2c462a2-ramips-mt7621-tplink_archer-a6-v3-squashfs-factory.bin (SHA256 10bc02f59d2f50500852a05e58effc0fd88824d8a45fd818541e31b5a864dad9) from the factory firmware web interface without problems.
I was just able to open my router up and was surprised at how easy it was. Just have to unscrew the 2 screws on the back and use a pry tool on the top case!
Thanks for the help @lutchann!
Were you able to flash the openwrt snapshots after flashing with Petr Štetiar's firmware, or did you stick with Petr's firmware?