thanks sagemol, for pointing me in that direction.
there was indeed a partial solution to be found.
In my case i still had to have connected both tx and rx, however, it appears that my router does not like slow speeds and only accepts the fastest option, 115200.
i was not able to interrupt the booting process though, it did not accept input at all, however, in the serial console i found that tftp was available so i placed a new code.bin there [You can download 10.03 build called openwrt-ar71xx-wrt160nl-squashfs.bin.. tftp -i 192.168.1.1 put code.bin ]
After which it got totally bricked and no tftp is started anymore.
So now i do really seem to need to get write acces going in uboot.
2 small things though, in all speeds it gives gibrish info, except for 115200 baud, however ,this is not completely the case. It still starts with 1 gibrish letter before showing the bootinfo
ÿ
U-Boot 1.1.6 (Apr 14 2010 - 14:02:36)
Should i interpret this as my router not liking this speed either and it being the cause of that i cant type ?(i basically tried this list: http://www.finseth.com/parts/serial.php )
My complete boot screen reads this:
ÿ
U-Boot 1.1.6 (Apr 14 2010 - 14:02:36)
DRAM: ar7100_ddr_initial_config(237) enter!
ar7100_ddr_initial_config(269) exit!
U-Boot 1.1.6 (Apr 14 2010 - 14:02:36)
AP81 (ar7100) U-boot
sri
32 MB
WRT160NL u-boot version: 1.0.0
Top of RAM usable for U-Boot at: 82000000
Reserving 279k for U-Boot at: 81fb8000
Reserving 192k for malloc() at: 81f88000
Reserving 44 Bytes for Board Info at: 81f87fd4
Reserving 36 Bytes for Global Data at: 81f87fb0
Reserving 128k for boot params() at: 81f67fb0
Stack Pointer at: 81f67f98
Now running in RAM - U-Boot at: 81fb8000
id read 0x100000ff
flash size 8MB, sector count = 128
Flash: 8 MB
*** Warning - bad CRC, using default environment
In: serial
Out: serial
Err: serial
Net: ag7100_enet_initialize...
ag7100 get ethaddr for device eth0
Fetching MAC Address from 0x81feb1e0
--------***** Get the RTL8306SD Manufactory ID=379c *****-------
Reg6: speed=0 nway=1 duplex=0
Reg5: speed=0 nway=0 duplex=0
Reg1: a1=7fd9 a2=30e0 a3=15ac a4=30e0 a5=0
Reg1: a1=7fd9 a2=30e0 a3=15ac a4=30e0
Reg1: a1=7fd9 a2=30e0 a3=15ac a4=30e0
Reg1: a1=7fd9 a2=30e0 a3=15ac a4=30e0
Reg1: a1=7fd9 a2=30e0 a3=15ac a4=30e0
eth0: 58:6d:8f:89:b1:c8
eth0 up
eth0
### main_loop entered: bootdelay=1
Hit any key to stop autoboot: 0
## Booting WRT160NL ...
Application code length 0x00280000
CRC OK
## Booting image at bf04003c ...
Image Name: MIPS OpenWrt Linux-2.6.32.10
Created: 2010-04-06 13:03:41 UTC
Image Type: MIPS Linux Kernel Image (gzip compressed)
Data Size: 1227486 Bytes = 1.2 MB
Load Address: 80060000
Entry Point: 80060000
Verifying Checksum ... OK
Uncompressing Kernel Image ... OK
kernel: org len = 1227486, new len = 1245184
No initrd
## Transferring control to Linux (at address 80060000) ...
## Giving linux memsize in bytes, 33554432
Starting kernel ...
Linux version 2.6.32.10 (openwrt@wrt1.marcant.net) (gcc version 4.3.3 (GCC) ) #20 Tue Apr 6 15:01:26 CEST 2010
bootconsole [early0] enabled
CPU revision is: 00019374 (MIPS 24Kc)
Atheros AR9130 rev 2, CPU:400.000 MHz, AHB:200.000 MHz, DDR:400.000 MHz
Determined physical RAM map:
memory: 02000000 @ 00000000 (usable)
Initrd not found or empty - disabling initrd
Zone PFN ranges:
Normal 0x00000000 -> 0x00002000
Movable zone start PFN for each node
early_node_map[1] active PFN ranges
0: 0x00000000 -> 0x00002000
Built 1 zonelists in Zone order, mobility grouping on. Total pages: 8128
Kernel command line: rootfstype=squashfs,yaffs,jffs2 noinitrd console=ttyS0,115200 board=WRT160NL
PID hash table entries: 128 (order: -3, 512 bytes)
Dentry cache hash table entries: 4096 (order: 2, 16384 bytes)
Inode-cache hash table entries: 2048 (order: 1, 8192 bytes)
Primary instruction cache 64kB, VIPT, 4-way, linesize 32 bytes.
Primary data cache 32kB, 4-way, VIPT, cache aliases, linesize 32 bytes
Writing ErrCtl register=00000000
Readback ErrCtl register=00000000
Memory: 29332k/32768k available (2101k kernel code, 3436k reserved, 397k data, 152k init, 0k highmem)
SLUB: Genslabs=7, HWalign=32, Order=0-3, MinObjects=0, CPUs=1, Nodes=1
Hierarchical RCU implementation.
NR_IRQS:56
Calibrating delay loop... 266.24 BogoMIPS (lpj=1331200)
Mount-cache hash table entries: 512
NET: Registered protocol family 16
MIPS: machine is Linksys WRT160NL
bio: create slab <bio-0> at 0
Switching to clocksource MIPS
NET: Registered protocol family 2
IP route cache hash table entries: 1024 (order: 0, 4096 bytes)
TCP established hash table entries: 1024 (order: 1, 8192 bytes)
TCP bind hash table entries: 1024 (order: 0, 4096 bytes)
TCP: Hash tables configured (established 1024 bind 1024)
TCP reno registered
NET: Registered protocol family 1
squashfs: version 4.0 (2009/01/31) Phillip Lougher
Registering mini_fo version $Id$
JFFS2 version 2.2. (NAND) (SUMMARY) © 2001-2006 Red Hat, Inc.
yaffs Mar 28 2010 17:53:41 Installing.
msgmni has been set to 57
io scheduler noop registered
io scheduler deadline registered (default)
Serial: 8250/16550 driver, 1 ports, IRQ sharing disabled
serial8250.0: ttyS0 at MMIO 0x18020000 (irq = 11) is a 16550A
console [ttyS0] enabled, bootconsole disabled
console [ttyS0] enabled, bootconsole disabled
Atheros AR71xx SPI Controller driver version 0.2.4
m25p80 spi0.0: unrecognized JEDEC id ef4017
ag71xx_mdio: probed
eth0: Atheros AG71xx at 0xb9000000, irq 4
Registering RTL8306SDM switch with Chip ID: 0x5988, version: 0x0000
eth1: Atheros AG71xx at 0xba000000, irq 5
Atheros AR71xx hardware watchdog driver version 0.1.0
TCP westwood registered
NET: Registered protocol family 17
802.1Q VLAN Support v1.8 Ben Greear <greearb@candelatech.com>
All bugs added by David S. Miller <davem@redhat.com>
VFS: Cannot open root device "<NULL>" or unknown-block(0,0)
Please append a correct "root=" boot option; here are the available partitions:
Kernel panic - not syncing: VFS: Unable to mount root fs on unknown-block(0,0)
i hope someone can help me out again 
