Thanks for all the info, you've been a great help.
Is it fair to say (in general) that custom firmware for routers (inluding this one) - Peformance will almost always be slighty worse (maybe much worse) because the hardward/software is not optimised ?
What you are gaining is extra functionality and maybe security patches/updates
Yes, VLANS are not available via GUI but as i said Gargoyle is OpenWRT with different "theme" so you can assign vlans via CLI
About SSH, i have successfully connect. Actually its enabled by default so looks like you did something wrong 
Not, exactly the opposite. Performance will be better.
What you gain is explained at Home page https://openwrt.org/
Why use OpenWrt?
People install OpenWrt because they believe it works better than the stock firmware from their vendor. They find it is more stable, offers more features, is more secure and has better support.
Extensibility: OpenWrt provides many capabilities found only in high-end devices. Its 3000+ application packages are standardized, so you can easily replicate the same setup on any supported device, including two (or even five) year old routers. More...
Security: OpenWrt's standard installation is secure by default, with Wi-Fi disabled, no poor passwords or backdoors. OpenWrt's software components are kept up-to-date, so vulnerabilities get closed shortly after they are discovered. More...
Performance and Stability: OpenWrt firmware is made of standardized modules used in all supported devices. This means each module will likely receive more testing and bug fixing than stock firmware which can be tweaked for each product line and never touched again. More...
Strong Community Support: OpenWrt team members are regular participants on the OpenWrt Forum, OpenWrt Developer and OpenWrt Admin mailing lists, and LEDE's IRC channels. You can interact directly with developers, volunteers managing the software modules and with other long-time OpenWrt users, drastically increasing the chances you will solve the issue at hand. More...
Research: Many teams use OpenWrt as a platform for their research into network performance. This means that the improvements of their successful experiments will be available in OpenWrt first, well before it gets incorporated into mainline, vendor firmware. More...
Open Source/No additional cost: OpenWrt is provided without any monetary cost. It has been entirely created by a team of volunteers: developers and maintainers, individuals and companies. If you enjoy using OpenWrt, consider contributing some effort to help us improve it for others! All of the above is possible because OpenWrt is part of the Open Source community, and powered by Linux kernel. Get the source code...
And more…
Well...it took adding one more IoT item to my 2.4GHz network to cause random lock-ups and WiFi drops on 19.07.3 ath79. (I can't add my IoT devices to the 5GHz as these devices do not support 5GHz).
I noticed that the Gargoyle firmware is based on ar71xx. So, I've done a clean install of 18.06.8 using ar71xx on my Archer C7 V2. So far, after about 3 days, it's working pretty good. I'll keep an eye on it and report back my findings at a later date.
EDIT: One side effect I've seen switching to 18.06.8 is that system and WiFi LED lights no longer work. WiFi works; it just doesn't flash the LED lights. LEDs for power and the Ethernet connections work.
It seems that my setup is similar to @Pocket_Sevens. I also have IoT devices that only work with 2.4 GHz and are on a separate VLAN.
And it seems 18.06.8 worked well for 2.4GHz but 5GHz sucked badly. Back on 19.07.3 (not a custom build but the prebuilt firmware). Going to see how that one goes for a few days.
I have the same issue with 19.07.3 on Archer C7. 2.4 ghz drops out after about 48 hours. Restarting the radio fixes it.
Does switching to the non-ct drivers help?
Non-ct causes less lockups for me.
How bad are the lockups with non-ct
And what the hell is non-ct ?!
I'd love to try 19.07.3 on my C7v2. However I can't have it less than stable
I'm using two non ct archer c7v2's to have an encrypted mesh ("bridge over wireless of two networks"). At the consuming side of the bridge, high data rates are sometimes demanded (stream, ps4 downloading, ...) Now stable since weeks without a reboot but under heavy load (lan port to wifi bridge, 400 mbit+) it can lockup. It did more lockups before when I used ct drivers and wds bridging.
I seem to be having (possibly) the same issue with 19.7.3 (my first install), where every 24-48 hours some devices aren't able to connect via wifi. I get errors like "Authentication error" on Android, or just repeatedly asking for the password on my PinePhone with UBtouch. Restarting the router and affected devices fixes the issue temporarily. Strangely, some devices like our Xbox One and Chromebook seem unaffected.
I'm running on a C7 v5 with the following specs:
Model: TP-Link Archer C7 v5
Architecture: Qualcomm Atheros QCA956X ver 1 rev 0
Firmware Version: OpenWrt 19.07.3 r11063-85e04e9f46 / LuCI openwrt-19.07 branch git-20.221.53167-304ad04
Kernel Version: 4.14.180
I skimmed a lot of this thread, but not all of it, so are there any general suggestions people are trying? KRACK seems to be already off by default already. Is there an ath10k package I should be installing? I didn't see one for QCA956X... i'm also planning to check if my ISP supplied modem is also using the same internal IP a la this post.
@WoRThog Switch to non ct and be happy.
echo "[INFO] Switching WiFi firmware from ct to non-ct ..."
opkg update
opkg remove ath10k-firmware-qca988x-ct kmod-ath10k-ct ath10k-firmware-qca988x-ct-full-htt
opkg install ath10k-firmware-qca988x kmod-ath10k
didnt work
login as: root
root@192.168.1.1's password:
Access denied
root@192.168.1.1's password:
BusyBox v1.31.1 () built-in shell (ash)
_______ ________ __
| |.-----.-----.-----.| | | |.----.| |_
| - || _ | -__| || | | || _|| _|
|_______|| __|_____|__|__||________||__| |____|
|__| W I R E L E S S F R E E D O M
-----------------------------------------------------
OpenWrt SFE, r13152-5019a06fc1
-----------------------------------------------------
root@OpenWrt:~# opkg update
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/targets/ath79/generic/packages/Packages.gz
Updated list of available packages in /var/opkg-lists/openwrt_core
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/mips_24kc/base/Packages.gz
Updated list of available packages in /var/opkg-lists/openwrt_base
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/mips_24kc/luci/Packages.gz
Updated list of available packages in /var/opkg-lists/openwrt_luci
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/mips_24kc/packages/Packages.gz
Updated list of available packages in /var/opkg-lists/openwrt_packages
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/mips_24kc/routing/Packages.gz
Updated list of available packages in /var/opkg-lists/openwrt_routing
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/mips_24kc/telephony/Packages.gz
Updated list of available packages in /var/opkg-lists/openwrt_telephony
root@OpenWrt:~# opkg remove ath10k-firmware-qca988x-ct kmod-ath10k-ct
Removing package kmod-ath10k-ct from root...
root@OpenWrt:~# opkg install ath10k-firmware-qca988x kmod-ath10k
Installing ath10k-firmware-qca988x (2019-10-03-d622d160-1) to root...
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/mips_24kc/base/ath10k-firmware-qca988x_2019-10-03-d622d160-1_mips_24kc.ipk
Installing kmod-ath10k (5.4.52+5.8-1-1) to root...
Downloading http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/targets/ath79/generic/packages/kmod-ath10k_5.4.52%2b5.8-1-1_mips_24kc.ipk
Collected errors:
* check_data_file_clashes: Package ath10k-firmware-qca988x wants to install file /lib/firmware/ath10k/QCA988X/hw2.0/board.bin
But that file is already provided by package * ath10k-firmware-qca988x-ct-full-htt
* opkg_install_cmd: Cannot install package ath10k-firmware-qca988x.
* satisfy_dependencies_for: Cannot satisfy the following dependencies for kmod-ath10k:
* kernel (= 5.4.52-1-78d69ca85441e8b74ee2a9235409e45d)
* opkg_install_cmd: Cannot install package kmod-ath10k.
root@OpenWrt:~# ^C
root@OpenWrt:~#
I've updated my post above.
So scrolling trought this post i see so many things, and it confuses me.
I own two Archer C7 V2 and flashed the latest OpenWRT SFE, I only use the device as AP so i disabled all services like firewall,dhcpd etc etc. Also removed Luci so i setup all using CLI.
As for now what is the best firmware for best performance CT/NON CT/ or stock ct-htt or maybe small-framebuffers?
Or as i only used it for AP my router will consume way less ram and i'm good regardless?
Hope someone with some expierence can update me
I'm no expert, but this part of your log:
...looks like you just needed to also remove the package ath10k-firmware-qca988x-ct-full-htt as well, before installing the non-ct packages...
I just installed mentioned SFE fork and still loosing the 2.4GHz. It's a crap ;-(
On my own build i diden't encounter any 2.4 drops yet, i have the 5ghz as mesh backbone andx 2.4 for the devices.
Can you share your build ?
Hello folks. Figured I could comment with my own experience.
I've been watching this thread for a bit and i've had major problems with 19.x when I first migrated to it. I could barely get a few hours if not minutes with the devices becoming unresponsive. It did not appear to be a memory issue based on logs. No variation of ath10k packages changed the behavior. No special changes around KRACK, inactivity timeouts, flow offloading etc. Pretty default aside from zones, AP/client, routing.
With ath10k-firmware-qca988x-ct-htt and kmod-ath10k-ct-smallbuffers on a fresh reset as well as everything re-configured by hand, its been working pretty stable. At least no worse than 17.x was. All the other packages are updated to their latest version.
Activity & traffic is quite high as I use it in a business setup w/ a fibre uplink.
I have two v2 devices acting as an AP, and another as a STA using WDS.
Both devices serve 2.4 and 5ghz with the STA using both radios to connect to the AP.
In addition I have a virtual interface to serve guest wifi on 2.4
There is a lot of heavy traffic with a NAS and a Pi manging VPN via strongswan connected to the client.
I have not been able to identify what in the configuration is different from the initial installation of 19 upgraded to 19.07.3 to my fresh install on 19.07.3. So far so good?