I am new to OpenWRT. Used DD-WRT for some time and still have it on some of my routers but then decided to buy a better router, bought Netgear Nighthawk R7800 and then started hesitating installing DD-WRT.
Factory firmware is not too bad on this router and it is stable. It has pre-installed OpenVPN server and file server. The file server is stable (unlike DD-WRT) but it requires giving admin password to wan users which is unacceptable. Similar with OpenVPN - one password for all users.
A would give DD-WRT another try but hesitating because there is no way back. DD-WRT now breaks router's own bootloader and once installed DD-DRT you can not go back to factory firmware.
What about the OpenWRT project - do you lock newcomers or they are still free to go back to what they came from?
Thank you and please do not count my question offensive, I just want to know the aftermaths
To get some taste of OpenWRT, tried to load it into TP-link Archer C9 v.1 to start with and all my attempts failed. The router has DD-DRT loaded in it and after reflashing I see DD-WRT again. Tried to load Open-WRT via firmware upgrade and also using tftp recovery. Does anyone know if it is possible to install OpenWRT over DD-WRT or those routers are unrecoverable?
The general advice is to revert back to the stock OEM firmware and flashing OpenWrt from there. DD-WRT is known to replace the bootloader or do other invasive changes to (at least) some devices, while the OEM firmware provides a known starting point.
The Archer C9 is not a good candidate for OpenWrt since it has a Broadcom chipset. On the other hand, the R7800 uses Qualcomm Atheros chips which have very good compatibility.
And what @slh said, always revert to stock rather than try to flash directly between different third party firmwares. Netgear has a TFTP recovery mode which makes it simple to revert to stock at any time (unless the bootloader has been modified).
Yes, this is the plan - installing OpenWRT on R7800 but before doing that I would like to practice on routers I currently do not use which are two Archer C9 but they both have DD-WRT with DD-WRT modifyed bootloaders. No or limited WI-FI support is not an issue for the first introduction but it seems those routers are unpromising as they only imitate re-flashing to factory firmware but in reality make no changes.
You won't learn much about flashing OpenWrt by using a different router (even less when using a barely supported substitute) - and as far as OpenWrt and the Netgear r7800 are concerned, flashing is basically child proof and unbrickable in both directions.