Upgrade from old OpenWrt firmware (TL-WR1043ND Ver. 3.0)

Installing and Using OpenWrt
1

Hello,
My router is a TP-Link TL-WR1043ND Ver. 3.0 (on the Model-label of routers case)
Few years ago i setup openwrt. For some reason ist was necessary to install V2 on the V3 hardware, by changing a single byte in firmware.

|Hostname|:OpenWrt|
|Model|TP-Link TL-WR1043N/ND v2|
|Firmware Version|OpenWrt Chaos Calmer 15.05.1 / LuCI 15.05-149-g0d8bbd2 Release (git-15.363.78009-956be55)|

root@OpenWrt:~# cat /proc/cpuinfo
system type : Qualcomm Atheros QCA9558 ver 1 rev 0
machine : TP-LINK TL-WR1043ND v2
processor : 0
cpu model : MIPS 74Kc V5.0

I want to upgrade to an actual system now. (because a V3 FW now is available)

Can I upgrade my firmware to an actual openwrt firmware or do I need a complete install of the new firmware ?
I saved the current configuration (luci) but not sure it will be accepted by a newly installed firmware.
And I have seen there is another new stuff available called LEDE.
I'm not well informed about network stuff, so I need some advice to avoid remaining with a not working router.
Can I just do an upgrade using the following image:
openwrt-19.07.1-ath79-generic-tplink_tl-wr1043nd-v3-squashfs-sysupgrade.bin
and check "keep setting" in LUCYs firmware flash operations ?

thanks wally

2

Keep settings, no (there are incompatible changes) and you will need -F (force).

3

Seems it's going to get hairy :frowning:

4

Your device is 8 MB flash, 64 MB RAM, right?
There shouldn't be anything special, except that you are jumping over two releases (17.01 and 18.06) from a five-year old firmware...

Like slh said, the settings have changed too much. You need to reconfig it from scratch. (Do not restore a backup...)

Note that in 15.05 there is no "force" option in LuCI.
You need to download the firmware image to /tmp and use the sysupgrade script from SSH console, as the script has the force option also in the ancient 15.05. But using force enables you to change the device to use the proper V3 image (if you really do have a V3).

5

Thanks for reply

that is my problem. I do not have experience to do so.

Source of this info is the lable on the device.
Is there another possibility to get the version number from hardware ?

wally

6

I think that it makes no actual difference, as v2 and v3 are pretty much identical, (based on the hardware overview in wiki).

Just copy the /etc/config/network down and see if you have any specific settings there. And then manually (or via LuCI) edit similar settings to new firmware.

For vanilla connection to ISP, the OpenWrt defaults are usually ok. But if you have PPPoE, some special modem or so, you may need some actual settings that you already have on the current setup.

7

thank you for this information.
Good to know it's not trivial this time, so I need to be sufficiently prepared and/ or to find an expert on network stuff here.

wally