Hi
I have just received the Dir-853 A4 version and want to now use it as just an AP. I already have my own router.
I have read through the thread but nothing on the A4. Any help of what I can flash the router with and how I do that would be appreciated.
Thanks
Well, it's not supported, so not much, really...
Unless you want to help getting it supported.
Ah I see. I thought I might be missing something as I am completely new to this.
Well yes, if it could be supported that would be great as I would love to use the router rather than waste it. How would this work?
Thanks
Open it up, find the serial console, connect a TTL usb serial, and post the boot log.
Ok will do this when I get a chance to read how and buy the right things! Thank you very much
Hi @Trebor,
I have a firmware that might work for your device (or brick it 
). It has been tested by only 1 person before on the A4. I compiled it assuming everything is the same between both devices except the name.
If you really want to take the risk please send me a PM. This is just because it is based on Padavan and not openwrt and was asked before not to share them here.
Again this was only tested once so there is a small chance of bricking your device.
Hi @kar200 !
Could you share the A4 firmware with me as well. I've got an A4 I'd like to have OpenWRT on.
Have used your A3 firmware successfully in the past. Thanks of all the help.
WR
hi
Could you share the A4 firmware with me i want to test it
Hi, Can you please share your build for A4.
I am okay risk my router 
Will the A3 firmware work on A4 ?
Hi,
Hope you all are doing well,
I have DIR-853 A4 connected serial cable and here is boot log.
Can I install DIR-853 A3 firmware?
If not which firmware is supported by DIR 853 A4
Thanks for you time
PID hash table entries: 1024 (order: 0, 4096 bytes)
Dentry cache hash table entries: 32768 (order: 5, 131072 bytes)
Inode-cache hash table entries: 16384 (order: 4, 65536 bytes)
Writing ErrCtl register=00045680
Readback ErrCtl register=00045680
Memory: 236180k/262144k available (6507k kernel code, 25964k reserved, 2646k data, 13560k init, 0k highmem)
Hierarchical RCU implementation.
NR_IRQS:128
console [ttyS1] enabled
Calibrating delay loop... 574.46 BogoMIPS (lpj=1148928)
pid_max: default: 32768 minimum: 301
Mount-cache hash table entries: 512
launch: starting cpu1
launch: cpu1 gone!
CPU1 revision is: 0001992f (MIPS 1004Kc)
Primary instruction cache 32kB, 4-way, VIPT, linesize 32 bytes.
Primary data cache 32kB, 4-way, PIPT, no aliases, linesize 32 bytes
MIPS secondary cache 256kB, 8-way, linesize 32 bytes.
Synchronize counters for CPU 1: done.
launch: starting cpu2
launch: cpu2 gone!
CPU2 revision is: 0001992f (MIPS 1004Kc)
Primary instruction cache 32kB, 4-way, VIPT, linesize 32 bytes.
Primary data cache 32kB, 4-way, PIPT, no aliases, linesize 32 bytes
MIPS secondary cache 256kB, 8-way, linesize 32 bytes.
Synchronize counters for CPU 2: done.
launch: starting cpu3
launch: cpu3 gone!
CPU3 revision is: 0001992f (MIPS 1004Kc)
Primary instruction cache 32kB, 4-way, VIPT, linesize 32 bytes.
Primary data cache 32kB, 4-way, PIPT, no aliases, linesize 32 bytes
MIPS secondary cache 256kB, 8-way, linesize 32 bytes.
Synchronize counters for CPU 3: done.
Brought up 4 CPUs
devtmpfs: initialized
NET: Registered protocol family 16
release PCIe RST: RALINK_RSTCTRL = 7000000
PCIE PHY initialize
***** Xtal 40MHz *****
start MT7621 PCIe register access
RALINK_PCI_PCICFG_ADDR= 21007f2
RALINK_PCI_PCICFG_ADDR = 21007f0
RALINK_RSTCTRL = 7000000
RALINK_CLKCFG1 = 77ffeff8
*************** MT7621 PCIe RC mode *************
PCIE1 no card, disable it(RST&CLK)
PCIE2 no card, disable it(RST&CLK)
pcie_link status = 0x1
RALINK_RSTCTRL= 1000000
*** Configure Device number setting of Virtual PCI-PCI bridge ***
RALINK_PCI_PCICFG_ADDR = 21007f0 -> 21007f0
PCIE0 enabled
interrupt enable status: 100000
Port 0 N_FTS = 1b105000
config reg done
init_rt2880pci done
bio: create slab <bio-0> at 0
vgaarb: loaded
SCSI subsystem initialized
usbcore: registered new interface driver usbfs
usbcore: registered new interface driver hub
usbcore: registered new device driver usb
PCI host bridge to bus 0000:00
pci_bus 0000:00: root bus resource [mem 0x60000000-0x6fffffff]
pci_bus 0000:00: root bus resource [io 0x1e160000-0x1e16ffff]
pci_bus 0000:00: No busn resource found for root bus, will use [bus 00-ff]
pci 0000:00:00.0: bridge configuration invalid ([bus 00-00]), reconfiguring
pci 0000:00:00.0: BAR 0: can't assign mem (size 0x80000000)
pci 0000:00:00.0: BAR 8: assigned [mem 0x60000000-0x600fffff]
pci 0000:00:00.0: BAR 1: assigned [mem 0x60100000-0x6010ffff]
pci 0000:01:00.0: BAR 0: assigned [mem 0x60000000-0x600fffff 64bit]
pci 0000:00:00.0: PCI bridge to [bus 01]
pci 0000:00:00.0: bridge window [mem 0x60000000-0x600fffff]
PCI: Enabling device 0000:00:00.0 (0004 -> 0006)
BAR0 at slot 0 = 0
bus=0x0, slot = 0x0
res[0]->start = 0
res[0]->end = 0
res[1]->start = 60100000
res[1]->end = 6010ffff
res[2]->start = 0
res[2]->end = 0
res[3]->start = 0
res[3]->end = 0
res[4]->start = 0
res[4]->end = 0
res[5]->start = 0
res[5]->end = 0
bus=0x1, slot = 0x0, irq=0x4
res[0]->start = 60000000
res[0]->end = 600fffff
res[1]->start = 0
res[1]->end = 0
res[2]->start = 0
res[2]->end = 0
res[3]->start = 0
res[3]->end = 0
res[4]->start = 0
res[4]->end = 0
res[5]->start = 0
res[5]->end = 0
Switching to clocksource Ralink Systick timer
NET: Registered protocol family 2
TCP established hash table entries: 2048 (order: 2, 16384 bytes)
TCP bind hash table entries: 2048 (order: 2, 16384 bytes)
TCP: Hash tables configured (established 2048 bind 2048)
TCP: reno registered
UDP hash table entries: 256 (order: 1, 8192 bytes)
UDP-Lite hash table entries: 256 (order: 1, 8192 bytes)
NET: Registered protocol family 1
NTFS driver 2.1.30 [Flags: R/O].
jffs2: version 2.2. (NAND) (ZLIB) (RTIME) (c) 2001-2006 Red Hat, Inc.
fuse init (API version 7.22)
msgmni has been set to 461
io scheduler noop registered (default)
reg_int_mask=0, INT_MASK= 0
HSDMA_init
hsdma_phy_tx_ring0 = 0x092b0000, hsdma_tx_ring0 = 0xa92b0000
hsdma_phy_rx_ring0 = 0x092b4000, hsdma_rx_ring0 = 0xa92b4000
TX_CTX_IDX0 = 0
TX_DTX_IDX0 = 0
RX_CRX_IDX0 = 3ff
RX_DRX_IDX0 = 0
set_fe_HSDMA_glo_cfg
HSDMA_GLO_CFG = 465
Serial: 8250/16550 driver, 2 ports, IRQ sharing disabled
serial8250: ttyS0 at MMIO 0x1e000d00 (irq = 27) is a 16550A
serial8250: ttyS1 at MMIO 0x1e000c00 (irq = 26) is a 16550A
Ralink gpio driver initialized
brd: module loaded
MediaTek Nand driver init, version v2.1 Fix AHB virt2phys error
Allocate 16 byte aligned buffer: 81643260
Enable NFI Clock
# MTK NAND # : Use HW ECC
NAND ID [2C F1 80 95 04, 00809504]
Device not found, ID: 2cf1
Not Support this Device!
chip_mode=00000001
Support this Device in MTK table! 2cf1
NAND device: Manufacturer ID: 0x2c, Chip ID: 0xf1 (Micron NAND 128MiB 3,3V 8-bit), 128MiB, page size: 2048, OOB size: 64
[NAND]select ecc bit:4, sparesize :64 spare_per_sector=16
Scanning device for bad blocks
Signature matched and data read!
load_fact_bbt success 1023
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
Creating 10 MTD partitions on "MT7621-NAND":
0x000000000000-0x000007f80000 : "ALL"
0x000000000000-0x000000080000 : "Bootloader"
0x000000080000-0x000000100000 : "Config"
0x000000100000-0x000000140000 : "Factory"
0x000000140000-0x000000180000 : "Config2"
0x000000180000-0x000002980000 : "Kernel"
0x000002980000-0x000004980000 : "Private"
0x000004980000-0x000007180000 : "Kernel2"
0x000007180000-0x000007780000 : "mydlink"
0x000007780000-0x000008080000 : "Reserved"
mtd: partition "Reserved" extends beyond the end of device "MT7621-NAND" -- size truncated to 0x800000
[mtk_nand] probe successfully!
IMQ driver loaded successfully. (numdevs = 2, numqueues = 1)
Hooking IMQ before NAT on PREROUTING.
Hooking IMQ after NAT on POSTROUTING.
tun: Universal TUN/TAP device driver, 1.6
tun: (C) 1999-2004 Max Krasnyansky <maxk@qualcomm.com>
PPP generic driver version 2.4.2
PPP BSD Compression module registered
PPP MPPE Compression module registered
NET: Registered protocol family 24
PPTP driver version 0.8.5
register mt_drv
=== pAd = c2201000, size = 3820896 ===
<-- RTMPAllocAdapterBlock, Status=0
pAd->PciHif.CSRBaseAddress =0xc2100000, csr_addr=0xc2100000!
RTMPInitPCIeDevice():device_id=0x7615
DriverOwn()::Try to Clear FW Own...
DriverOwn()::Success to clear FW Own
mt_pci_chip_cfg(): HWVer=0x8a10, FWVer=0x8a10, pAd->ChipID=0x7615
mt_pci_chip_cfg(): HIF_SYS_REV=0x76150001
RtmpChipOpsHook(492): Not support for HIF_MT yet! MACVersion=0x0
mt7615_init()-->
Use 1st iPAiLNA default bin.
Load EEPROM Buffer from /etc_ro/wlan/MT7615_2G_EEPROM.bin
Use 1st iPAiLNA default bin.
Use 1st iPAiLNA default bin.
Load EEPROM Buffer from /etc_ro/wlan/MT7615_2G_EEPROM.bin
Use 1st iPAiLNA default bin.
<--mt7615_init()
ChipOpsMCUHook
cut_through_token_list_init(): TokenList inited done!id_head/tail=0/4096
cut_through_token_list_init(): 8ffc3a08,8ffc3a08
cut_through_token_list_init(): TokenList inited done!id_head/tail=0/4096
cut_through_token_list_init(): 8ffc3a18,8ffc3a18
<-- RTMPAllocTxRxRingMemory, Status=0
[MTWF][dlink_mesh_check_data_struct]: check data structure: PASS
[MTWF][mesh_module_init]: init hook functions.
rdm_major = 253
GMAC1_MAC_ADRH -- : 0x0000a863
GMAC1_MAC_ADRL -- : 0x7dbda9ae
Ralink APSoC Ethernet Driver Initilization. v3.1 1024 rx/tx descriptors allocated, mtu = 1500!
GMAC1_MAC_ADRH -- : 0x0000a863
GMAC1_MAC_ADRL -- : 0x7dbda9ae
PROC INIT OK!
usbcore: registered new interface driver usb-storage
u32 classifier
Netfilter messages via NETLINK v0.30.
nf_conntrack version 0.5.0 (3690 buckets, 14760 max)
ctnetlink v0.93: registering with nfnetlink.
xt_time: kernel timezone is -0000
ipip: IPv4 over IPv4 tunneling driver
gre: GRE over IPv4 demultiplexor driver
ip_tables: (C) 2000-2006 Netfilter Core Team
Type=Linux
TCP: cubic registered
Initializing XFRM netlink socket
NET: Registered protocol family 10
ip6_tables: (C) 2000-2006 Netfilter Core Team
sit: IPv6 over IPv4 tunneling driver
NET: Registered protocol family 17
NET: Registered protocol family 15
l2tp_core: L2TP core driver, V2.0
l2tp_ppp: PPPoL2TP kernel driver, V2.0
8021q: 802.1Q VLAN Support v1.8
Warning: unable to open an initial console.
Freeing unused kernel memory: 13560K (808f2000 - 81630000)
Algorithmics/MIPS FPU Emulator v1.5
[system]: tw_hotplug &
old 0.3, now 0.3
[system]: killall nvram_daemon
[system]: nvram_daemon &
===nvram_daemon.c========main==
===check_Default_Config===atoi(factory_flag) :1==========
check_flag:0
===check_Default_Config====access(/private/factory_mode, 0):0===========
nvram_daemon.c:main:1091:=nvram_bufget(RT2860_NVRAM, WebInit)==1=
nvram_daemon.c:main:1112:=nvram_bufget(WIFI3_NVRAM, WebInit)==1====
Complete log Here https://docs.google.com/document/d/14h_Ciifu2cq5T6KOM4FSmydCXisLRDP5952GvVaUWF0/edit?usp=sharing
Hi all sorry for the late reply i dont check as often anymore.
Due to my organisational skills i dont have the pasavan firmware anymore.
I can change the A3 version header to show A4 and encrypt it so you can flash it directly from the web interface except it will show everything like an A3 (which in theory is better if you want to flash future releases of openwrt as the A4 is not supported).
It will take me a few days as i am away from home. I will just need first someone with console access in case it doesnt work at least we can recover.
I will then post a link for the version.
I have just created an encrypted version from the new A3 openwrt official release with change of header and encrypted.
I have sent a copy to @MianHannan just to make sure it works (and since he has console access it will be easy to recover).
Once I get confirmation that it is working I will share the link here so you can try.
K
Hi.. any update..?
Before flashing the a3 open wrt .bin file I just wanted to backup the current firmware. For that purpose I spent whole day yesterday and figured out I have only two options.
Using MD command in uboot
Using nand read command in uboot
Both options have speed of serial connection 57600 baud/sec
For entire flash to copy it will take about 17 hours at this speed.
If I just want to copy the firmware that can be flashed back in case of bricking at what location I have to copy using MD command and how much size should I copy for firmware backup?
After firmware backup I will surely try the openwrt .bin file sent by @kr200
for next time
you best option is load the "initramfs" image into ram via uboot & tftp
and just save the firmware MTD in the luci interface
it's always good to backup everything at this point 
At this moment, DIR853 A4 have stock firmware, that I want to backup. In uboot I have tftpboot that can only boot from tftp not put firmware to tftp.
And at which location and what size the firmware is in routers flash.
From boot log
Creating 10 MTD partitions on "MT7621-NAND":
0x000000000000-0x000007f80000 : "ALL"
0x000000000000-0x000000080000 : "Bootloader"
0x000000080000-0x000000100000 : "Config"
0x000000100000-0x000000140000 : "Factory"
0x000000140000-0x000000180000 : "Config2"
0x000000180000-0x000002980000 : "Kernel"
0x000002980000-0x000004980000 : "Private"
0x000004980000-0x000007180000 : "Kernel2"
0x000007180000-0x000007780000 : "mydlink"
0x000007780000-0x000008080000 : "Reserved"
mtd: partition "Reserved" extends beyond the end of device "MT7621-NAND" -- size truncated to 0x800000