Suggestions for Routers | Dual Firmware for 150 USD

Hardware Questions and Recommendations
1

Hello Fam,

I am planning to setup a captive portal in a router. I would also like to have few features,

  1. Dashboard to view analytics ->For which I am planning to go for Grafana + Influx DB or just to get the data and push it to coud where i run grafana + influxdb
  2. Dual firmwate Partitioning for OTA updates to the router. (most like with the help of mender)

The use case is, we own a few cafes and restaurants, I would like to provide the wifi to people after captive page, so that 1. privacy policies aggreed to collect analytics data. |

So can you please suggest me with best routers which can support these functions.

PS: I alreeady checked https://openwrt.org/tag/dual_firmware -> it is outdated.

2

Since Openwrt doesn't do OTA, I assume you're not looking for an Openwrt device ...?

And if you use a 3rd party tool for it, then you're really looking for something that can store the backup on flash ?

3

Hey,

No, I am planning to use OpenWRT for sure, The implementation of OTA updates from mender are done from my side. I would install mender client in openwrrt router device.

The requirement for such an ota update woruld be to have a inactive partition(A/b Partition)

Hence looking for those one with good storage space in ram and flash

4

It can’t really be outdated since it uses the devices tags.

But dual firmware for OpenWrt is most often one of two.

  1. It isn’t used at all.
  2. It shift between the two at every update of OpenWrt.
5

They need dual partition for mender.

6

@flygarn12 Thanks for the info.

I will recheck the ToH page again.

So what you mean is it is not possible for me to have a openWRT device which will support OTA updates?

7

Yes, Thats right. I need the boot loader in the router to be able to have two seperate partitions for firmare one for inactive and one for active, where i will pull the new firmware via mender out it in inactive partition and the load the firmware from there the next rebbot

8

I think this is getting lost in translation:

You can remotely admin OpenWrt and update it that way.
OTA is confusing people.

1 Like
9

Is x86 out of the question?

10

@LilRedDog

No I dont want to do that for 15 20 devices, every time i want to update it.

So the idea is, I will build the new openwrt firmware and host it in mender, and from mender dashboard, if i do update all, all the 15-20 openwrt routers which ahs the mender client will pull the image and load it in inactive partition which will then be used from them on

so it is not ssh into router and updating the firmware!

11

That is not OTA either but at least we now know your objective.

12

No, I am open for all the options. Please!

13

Sorry for my wrong choice of words, I am really sorry, a non native english speaker here :sweat_smile:

14

That is, absolutely, no problem.
It happens all the time. Google translate is only so good.

15

Will Any verion of the Raspberry pi Like nanopi or banana pi work as good wifi router?

Because, that will solve most of my problems

16

Raspberry Pis are not good WiFi.
Pi4 and 5 are great routers.
A zero2 W can be a travel router with a dongle.

Someone else on the other Pi flavors?

17

You can make them qemu hosts and snapshot+update at will.

18

Is wifi a must one the "OTA" device ?

19

If I use Pi4 as a router(with all the features i want) and then connect a normal home router to pi to provide internet as wifi to customers!

Will pi be able to handle 40-50 simultaneous connections without botteling?

20

Yes It is a must!