Support for TP-Link AX1800

For Developers
1

I am planning to buy TP-Link Ax1800, the reasons are many, first it's available, cheaper than other hardware (got a quadcore processor) although wouldn't know which one it is as tp-link documentation doesn't tell. I'm sure there is a way to figure that out.

I did see a few topics before I broach the subject, namely -

as well as -

The reason is if there is a possibility of no support for Ax1800 either now or in the future, then I might go in for Archer 6 3.2 which is also available.

One of the big reasons for thinking about the above is OpenWRT SQM. I am sure there are many more utilities or whatnot that may drag the cpu.

Looking forward to knowing more.

2

As already stated in the 1st thread you linked to, the ax20 is a Broadcom device, it'll never have any good wifi support, if at all.

1 Like
3

So the Ax1800 is also a Broadcom device, didn't know that. :frowning:

4

I assumed they were the same, I might have been wrong, it appears to be a Qualcomm device.
So it's supportable, but currently no Qualcomm AX devices are.

https://fccid.io/2AXJ4AX20V3/

5

Thank you, so I will use the stock till a build becomes available. Good to know it's a Qualcomm chip.

6

Yeah, but it will be 1+ away, and if I remember correctly, the Qualcomm AX software requires at least 512MB of RAM, you might want to make sure the device doesn't ship with less.

1 Like
7

hmmm.... Sadly that information seems to be missing -

Interestingly, it says it works only broadband connection (RJ-45) and is silent about fiber :frowning:

8

it'll be in the fccid.io photos, you "just" need to decode the chip markings into real MBs :wink:

note, the specs are usually in mbits, so whatever it says, you need to divide it by 8.

9

Beyond me, although I did get the link of the photos and I did download the photos, but it's pretty greek to me -

https://fccid.io/2AXJ4AX20V3/Internal-Photos/18-Internal-Photos-5798990.pdf

Somebody did share it has 1 GB of RAM but was that real or somebody talking out of their ass not known :frowning:

10

it's the ESMT chip on the 3rd photo, I think it's 512MB, but I'm not 100% sure, not familiar with the math used for calculating the capacity, but 32M x 16bit * 8 banks / 8 = 512.

11

Right, thank you for the datasheet you linked to, makes the whole thing clearer.

Ironically, now we have DDR4, but that is entirely a different argument -

12

@frollic, can you figure it out whether the router/modem is broadband-only or also fiber???

13

it works for both, but if you have fast fiber, it might be too slow.

14

cool, thank you :slight_smile:

17

First of thanks for the clarification and info @frollic.

I'm new in the community and not sure what it means to be 1+ away. Is it that is more than 1 release away or more than 1 release series away?

Is it likely to be out for the next 22.03 or do we need to wait for a 23.xx series (which is not that far I assume).

As a side note, I'm assuming the versions follow the format last_two_digits_of_year.release_number.

18

I'm unsure if this will help but I have got UART on the AX21, here is the boot log https://pastebin.com/Yuar6mEM
The shell in UART requires a login and it does not appear to be the same password as the web ui (for the root user anyway), although not sure if the web UI uses System users as auth for the login page.

The UART connector is shown in the image: https://cdn.jordanplayz158.xyz/uploads/9d832b07cb62f3fc4a80bc0bd05c6cffcfe862e7.png (too large to upload locally) sorry if I got the ordering wrong, TX and RX are a bit confusing as it swaps depending on which side, but I think I got it right in the photo. My moserial settings are as follows:

Device: /dev/ttyUSB0
Baud Rate: 115200
Data Bits: 8
Stop Bits: 1
Parity: None
Handshake: Hardware only
Access Mode: Read and Write
Local Echo: OFF

Here are all the photos throughout my journey:
Front: https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/122900397965705216/1090397539498467498/IMG_20230328_180945801.jpg
Back: https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/122900397965705216/1090399624893837473/IMG_20230328_181818555.jpg
Aluminum Cover off: https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/122900397965705216/1090419188914458647/IMG_20230328_193606.jpg
Best shot I could get of CPU given the reflective surface: https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/779504612906369028/1090679703272173599/IMG_20230328_195030763.jpg
UART Wired Up: https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/122900397965705216/1090666544280895639/IMG_20230329_115808422.jpg

Edit: I don't know how big or good of news this is, but the latest firmware for the router is actually using OpenWrt as a base, https://pastebin.com/jz1HrFsp
This was not what I was planning on finding, I was and still am searching the firmware for the magic login info /etc/passwd and /etc/shadow don't contain any passwords as far as I can gather

19

They all do, the bad news is, it's a Broadcom device.

20

Ah, yeah in that case, you said it might not have good wifi support or any at all, but if openwrt can run on it, I would still say it is beneficial as you get more options, like with my old Archer C7, I use it as a switch running OpenWrt

Edit: Also for the magic login info, it was staring me in the face the whole time, they disabled the root login by setting the password to "x" in /etc/passwd and /etc/shadow

21

You can search for the Broadcom SoC in https://openwrt.org/toh/views/toh_extended_all, see if there's any other, already supported device, using it.

22

Only the switch's chip has been used in 3 routers supported by OpenWrt. The CPU nor the WLAN Chip has been in any routers supported by OpenWrt.

Edit: I notice there is BCM63xx support, is there anything I can do to assist BCM67xx support?