Is there a certain Chipset and Drivers that’s preferred (or should be avoided)?

Hardware Questions and Recommendations
1

Hey everyone,

I’ve been digging into the hardware side of OpenWrt lately and I’m trying to figure out whether some SoCs are just better (or worse) for running the firmware.

Specifically, I’m curious about the Qualcomm‑Snapdragon family (the IPQ line that shows up in a lot of newer routers). I remember hearing that early Snapdragon chips had a few quirks on Windows, things like driver instability and performance hiccups. Since OpenWrt runs on Linux, I’m wondering if any of those issues carry over, or if there are other chipset‑related pitfalls I should be aware of.

Things like that come to mind are:

  • Wi‑Fi radio stability?
  • NAT/packet‑processing offload bugs?

From a security/privacy perspective, should I be wary of Qualcomm hardware at all?

I’ve seen a few “tinfoil‑hat” rumors about backdoors in Snapdragon, but I’m not sure how much of that applies to the routerfocused IPQ variants?

Which chipset do you use for a production‑grade home router?

Any “avoid this board” stories you can share of supported boards?

2

If not x64 or SBC, possibly without wifi, MediaTek.

3

OpenWrt is Linux

No open offload driver for Qualcomm ipq, proprietery blob driver caveat emptor.

Do not mix snapdragon with ipq (or filogic to helio)

There is always some rumour around, obviously nobody but their authors can rattle more.

checkers board is unlikely to route, breadcom (eg raspberry) has crappy wifi, ones with one ethernet port are very complex to set up.

4
  1. Mediatek Filogic 820/830 or 860/880
  2. x86
  3. everything else
5

1.01 if you dint need wifi - rockchip aka nanopi