Has anyone experimented with getting OpenWRT/LEDE working on newer Archer MR200's (version 4.0)? Kjell & Company (kjell.com) is doing a drive on these at the moment, and they turn out to be a newer version than what is currently supported (d'oh!)
I grabbed the GPL sources from TP-Link's site, but there's so much there it's rather daunting figuring out where to even start..
The main thing I'm after is QoS, since this will be used to control amateur radio stuff in my remote QTH, and I don't want to accidentally run out of data. Backup plan is to just use some small computer for the same task.
Is it the LTE capabilities that make the MR200v4 interesting to you?
If that's what you're looking for, the GL.iNet X750 ("Spitz") would be on the top of my list (~US$139). Ships with current OpenWrt, recent, reputable CAT6 LTE modem, solid OEM support. I have three other GL.iNet products and the build quality on them is excellent.
Yes, or any other already-existing data coverage. GPRS would be fine. I know that 4G works in my intended location. One problem is that I can only get to it half of the year, so I need to be sure the setup doesn't run out of data in winter. And I want to keep costs low.
I picked the MR200 because it's the only device available in town which supposedly works with OpenWRT. I've seen the Spitz recommended in other thread on here, perhaps ordering a few for the future would be a good idea.
A friend of mine pointed out that the MR200 actually has QoS, which I had missed when i poked around with it before posting here. So that'll tide me over at least.
"Friends don't let friends run OEM firmware" -- I'd check to see how ancient and insecure the TP-Link firmware is. It wouldn't surprise me if it is on Linux 3.x or even 2.x. "QoS" in a router, especially as advertised by an OEM, isn't the same thing as SQM or bandwidth shaping, which is likely what you would need to manage latency on a rate-limited link
Here's the GL.iNet repo -- as you can see, it is kept current with OpenWrt releases. If I had a Spitz in my hand, it would be very easy to directly support it within the OpenWrt project tree.
Looks like it has some sort of file system there, or it wouldn't get procd up and running.
Messages like
[ 0.123727] rt2880-pinmux pinctrl: invalid group "uartf" for function "gpio"
[ 0.130545] rt2880-pinmux pinctrl: invalid group "rgmii1" for function "gpio"
[ 0.137375] rt2880-pinmux pinctrl: invalid group "rgmii2" for function "gpio"
[ 0.144276] rt2880-pinmux pinctrl: invalid group "wled" for function "gpio"
[ 0.150983] rt2880-pinmux pinctrl: invalid group "nd_sd" for function "gpio"
[ 0.157799] rt2880-pinmux pinctrl: invalid group "ephy" for function "gpio"
[ 0.164507] rt2880-pinmux pinctrl: invalid group "spi refclk" for function "gpio"
suggest that the GPIO assignments are not right for some critical systems; likely Ethernet and SPI for NOR among them.
Yes, you're right. I was mixing initramfs and initrd, which explains my confusion.
Thanks for the tip. After correcting the pinctrl definition in the dts the device is now able to boot via TFTP
For the most part things are looking good. Ethernet working, WLAN working (both 2.4GHz and 5GHz).
I've yet to add mappings for the LEDs and buttons. Nor have I gotten the RNDIS interface for the modem to work yet, altough adb does work so that's a step in the right direction.
After taking a closer look I found that the modem in the V4 uses QMI instead of RNDIS.
With the related QMI packages installed, the interface shows up and there's /dev/cdc-wdm0.
However running any command against the device with uqmi just stalls.
Update:
I now have OpenWrt installed to flash by using sysupgrade in the TFTP-booted environment.
GPIO mappings for LEDs and buttons are now working, apart from a weird issue with the WLAN LED where if WLAN is disabled, the LED still lights up after boot. If you then enable and disable WLAN, it'll turn off and work as expected until next reboot.
Edit 2:
This modem needs the SET_DTR quirk in qmi_wwan to work at all. However I've only gotten it to search so far.
Edit 3:
Installing OpenWrt via TFTP recovery confirmed working. Also successfully reverted to stock by TFTP recovery.
Edit 4:
The modem is now mostly working. The IP address is not set automatically and it's rather finicky to get to work due to some proprietary executable that needs to be ran in the Android part.
I bought one of these very recently. I wasn't even planning to use OpenWrt with it: I mostly bought it to replace my aging combo of Huawei E5372 + TL-WR1043N.
I wanted something that was essentially a "LTE to ethernet" adapter (because getting the LTE modem to work with the TL-WR1043N back in 2015 was a bit of a pain, also it is stuck on an old OpenWrt version and I want to update without fear of breaking the setup).
Much to my disappointment/excitement it seems this MR200 v4 is essentially what I already had (a traditional router connected over USB to a LTE modem), but with way more proprietary glue code of dubious quality.
@Lochnair, did you make any progress on this since your last edit? By "mostly working", do you mean that a stable LTE data connection can be established after the initial "finicky" phase? Did you figure out what proprietary executable needs to be ran? I suppose the stock firmware does this over adb. I've been going through the GitHub and it seems that the LTE modem is the only thing that's not fully functional yet, is everything else relatively stable?
No, I gave up on it and bought a Teltonika RUT240 instead.
It's a bit foggy how far I got with it. IIRC I could never get it to reliably start the Android part properly on boot. And getting the IP set on the interface didn't work as it should either (without manually setting it).
I tried to look through the stock firmware for hints on how to enable the modem properly, but I couldn't find anything.
Anyone could provide me Mr200 V4 chip backup?
I have a company locked firm with tftp locked and the only way to get around is flashing the winbond chip...
I already have a programmer, I just need a chip backup for stock firm.
I'll probably be able to do so, but that unit is at our vacation home. So it won't be until our next trip there.
There's a good chance I'll go there for new years though.
Hello
Has anyone succeeded to run openwrt on MR200-V4?
If yes, Please provide me the file to flash from stock. I really need your help guys.
Or even please tell me the detailed steps.
Thank you in advance
