New router to me and was simply upgrading OpenWRT, I unchecked the option to keep settings and continued my flash. Pings dropped then never returned after 10 minutes.
Luckily this router I can hold a button to boot to U Boot and flash a new image from there. Thought it was a fluke, so I uploaded the same firmware in U Boot and everything went fine.
After booting into my up to date OpenWRT in the web gui I chose the option in Flash Operations to Perform Reset and the same thing, pings dropped and never returned after 10 minutes.
Go through the U Boot process again and I have a working router.
Nothing different. All OpenWRT defaults 192.168.1.1 because I haven't configured anything. I should add the LED on top also never comes on after reset to defaults. When it is functioning normally the LED is solid green.
It happened to me on several devices (different to yours) that reboot wasn't working properly, so the system would not boot up after a successful flash. Just power cycling the unit made it work perfectly. Did you try this?
Yes thanks. Tried that too, even overnight unplugged but no change. Another thing I notice today is after the failed reset and the LED stays off that when plugged into my computer I see the NIC switching between not connected and unidentified network every few seconds.
I flash in UBoot and everything comes back as expected.
Use a pretty dump desktop switch between the router and your computer to avoid link state flapping, or disable automatic management and setup the NIC manually.
Don't have a switch on hand and NIC IP is configured statically to 192.168.1.77 if that is what you mean by disabling automatic management.
No problem like this after flashing in UBoot and the biggest piece to this puzzle that makes me think it is bricked is the LED never comes on like it does every other when it is working
Hopefully @andros-ua doesn't mind I mention them, but saw them very active in the original post about this router. Surely someone else has tried to reset the device before and can confirm it works or there is something wonky with mine.
I think I found the solution and it was my fault. On the previously mentioned thread andros-ua says to be sure to switch the mtd layout to immortalwrt-112m when flashing in UBoot. I did that with my most recent flash and all is well. I can reset to defaults and it boots correctly.
Sounds like you are probably not using the official OpenWrt, but some "immortalwrt" spinoff fork. ( Or then the OEM has some adopted the immortalwrt as the OpenWrt representative, which is also strange.)
That is entirely possible it came with a fork. I didn't look into what firmware it came with originally, but I only flashed the below each attempt. Seems to be running fine now after choosing the mtd layout mentioned.
