Unbrick TP Link Archer C20

Installing and Using OpenWrt
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Hi All,

hope you guys could help me out on unbricking TP Link Archer C20 v1
I installed OpenWRT from https://openwrt.org/toh/tp-link/tp-link_archer_c20_v1, however something went wrong.
Currently when i turn it on - only USB LED lights up and nothing else, USB LED shines for a couple of seconds and turns off.
So i bought CP2102 chip to connect to the router via serial, however was not receiving anything in Putty console - decided to check the voltages on the TX and RX pins and they are both 0. Do i need to do any additional steps to be able to connect to the router via serial?

Thanks

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for the COM port to work, you need to unsolder the jumpers R600 and R601

3

Murchic, thanks for the reply,
do you mean solder these pins together?
20181112_190905

if there is still no response in the serial - does it mean bootloader is erased?

4

you need make jumper instead r600 and r601, use solder

5

From here its difficult to see if you have damaged the board, but it looks like you cut 3 or 4 tracks.

Grab some alcohol and clean up the board, then post another picture.

6

Hello @bss007, I was wondering if you managed to revive your router. Unfortunately I find myself in the same predicament; not even TFTP is working. Some information online leads me to conclude the bootloader may have been overwritten, so I'm wondering whether I should pay somebody to enable the serial port or buy a SOIC8 clip and flash the ROM.

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Have you managed to find a solution? I flashed the wrong image and got a non funciotional device. USB led turns on for about two seconds and then turns off. Serial port is non functional. Not sure if soldering/unsoldering is needed. @Murchic and @root, could you be more specific? I got a SOIC8 clip and wrote a c20v1 flash dump (EU version) I got somewhere here on this forum. However, nothing changed.

1 Like
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I bought a SOIC8 clip and used my Raspberry PI to recover my router using, if I recall correctly, the instructions under Recovering from a bad flash / Unbrick your router: https://pwassi.privatedns.org/lede/archerc20i/.

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Hi, no, i gave up and thrown the router into a drawer. But i see you have found a solution so might as well give this a try

10

I did the same procedure as you and the device still bricked
I've tried with the same "full dump" for c20v1(EU version) that you used and I tried with another dump generate by myself from another identical router that I have(a working device). The result was the same :frowning_face:

If anyone has another tip to try, please tell us.
For now, I´ll put this on hold because this procedure writing the image directly was my last hope :joy:

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