OpenWrt seems easy to corrupt, for inexperienced users

Oh. And it's been rebooted several times with the NG firmware w/no problem - running wired, and wireless g and n.

The only way to know what's happening is by patching in through serial. It might not be hardware related if NG Firmware is running fine.

Rest assured, usually setting up openwrt for the first time is very easy, your case seems a bit different.

Maybe next time you flash openwrt, do post it's system log and kernel log here when it boots up the very first time. It may give us hints how it's behaving under your hardware.

I can flash it one more time if you think it might show something. Hopefully I don't wear out the on/off button.

Another thing that occurred to me... and take no offense if you are one of the developers. Was an actual WNDR4500v3 used in development and test of the first OpenWrt release (20.02.0). Kinda strange my issue is a one off. I understand this is all open source and you get what you get (and I love it), but just wonderin'.

Just curious... which specific image did you flash? Can you give us the complete filename, please?

I suspect you flashed the "kernel" version -- initramfs. That runs in RAM and doesn't write to the flash memory. Typically, you use this image as a stepping stone to install OpenWrt for devices that don't support direct upgrades, or if you need to be able to test certain things without worrying about bricking the unit.

Try using the "factory" image and see if that works.
https://firmware-selector.openwrt.org/?version=21.02.1&target=ath79%2Fnand&id=netgear_wndr4500-v3

As an aside, you should be using 21.02.1.

Im interested to know if it crashes on a reboot, done from the restart menu in openwrt, or only on a power cycle.

Edit, looks like other users have the same issue, with doing a sysupgrade after install making the device stable;

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I have only used the "factory" version.
I used 20.02.1 for several tries and then tried 20.02.0 twice.

I've updated the techdata page for WNDR4500v3 using the link you provided to @DoS007 post for how to correctly install OpenWrt, until such time a dedicated device page is created.
https://openwrt.org/toh/hwdata/netgear/netgear_wndr4500_v3#

The latest stable image should've worked, unless it wasn't tested properly, since the device is basically new to support openwrt.

Without knowing the actual system log and kernel log, and most importantly serial log of the time when it fails to boot, it would be hard to figure out what's causing a no boot. Maybe it's not reading the config from flash or wrong address.

New devicepages can be created via https://openwrt.org/meta/create_new_device_page

-> https://openwrt.org/toh/netgear/wndr4500_v3

Feel free to fill it with useful information! :slight_smile:

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I followed the directions posted by DoS007 at Solved: Netgear WNDR4500v3 - brick / Bootloop after first reboot

My NG WNDR4500v3 now seems stable. Changed lan IP, rebooted couple times; still working.

My thanks to all. I am very happy and appreciate all help. In retrospect, dunno how I missed that post - bad on me.
But, I see you included it in the "device page", but maybe it needs to be in VERY LARGE CAPS.

Great that so many folks are involved in OpenWrt. Now I can get started onlining that router.

Jimmy

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