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Topic: Linksys E4200v2 firmware flash just reverts to factoy?

The content of this topic has been archived on 23 Apr 2018. There are no obvious gaps in this topic, but there may still be some posts missing at the end.

I am trying to flash the OpenWRT image found here (openwrt-kirkwood-linksys-viper-squashfs-factory.bin) through the OEM firmware; however, the progress bar gets to 50% and the router self reboots. When it comes back up, it's running the OEM firmware freshly reset. What is going on? I am running OEM firmware 2.1.41.164606.

I have done numerous hard resets (30/30/30), but it always ends up back at the OEM firmware.

(Last edited by heartsofwar on 28 Jan 2016, 19:33)

known issue due to bad nvram values, or a bad nvram section (who knows) there is a huge batch of these things (mostly V1 and some V2) with the same issue. When i tried to wipe the nvram via serial to force clean, i even completely bricked mine. eventually i wiped the nvram section by directly programming the flash-chip and that solved the issue. afterwards i could succesfully upgrade to openwrt.

(First i thought it was the bootloader that had an issue, but i tried rewriting that first to the chip, and that didn't help one bit.)

BTW: you are sure you have a V2 and not a V1?

JohnnySL wrote:

known issue due to bad nvram values, or a bad nvram section (who knows) there is a huge batch of these things (mostly V1 and some V2) with the same issue. When i tried to wipe the nvram via serial to force clean, i even completely bricked mine. eventually i wiped the nvram section by directly programming the flash-chip and that solved the issue. afterwards i could succesfully upgrade to openwrt.

(First i thought it was the bootloader that had an issue, but i tried rewriting that first to the chip, and that didn't help one bit.)

BTW: you are sure you have a V2 and not a V1?

Yes, I have v2 unfortunately. I was able to successfully flash from 2.1.39 OEM firmware to 2.1.41. If it was a corrupt nvram, wouldn't this have had problems too?

Are there step-by-step guides on how I can proceed from here or am I just SoL?

There are bugs with the current trunk for the EA4200v2 / EA4500.  They don't boot, so you end up reverted to stock.  That last working trunk image was January 4.  (I don't think today's January 28 works, either.)

(Last edited by zogg45 on 29 Jan 2016, 08:14)

zogg45 wrote:

There are bugs with the current trunk for the EA4200v2 / EA4500.  They don't boot, so you end up reverted to stock.  That last working trunk image was January 4.  (I don't think today's January 28 works, either.)

Is there a more updated dev page for the on-going issues? Are there links to the last known good January 4th image?

heartsofwar wrote:
JohnnySL wrote:

known issue due to bad nvram values, or a bad nvram section (who knows) there is a huge batch of these things (mostly V1 and some V2) with the same issue. When i tried to wipe the nvram via serial to force clean, i even completely bricked mine. eventually i wiped the nvram section by directly programming the flash-chip and that solved the issue. afterwards i could succesfully upgrade to openwrt.

(First i thought it was the bootloader that had an issue, but i tried rewriting that first to the chip, and that didn't help one bit.)

BTW: you are sure you have a V2 and not a V1?

Yes, I have v2 unfortunately. I was able to successfully flash from 2.1.39 OEM firmware to 2.1.41. If it was a corrupt nvram, wouldn't this have had problems too?

Are there step-by-step guides on how I can proceed from here or am I just SoL?

yup, that would have failed as well, if this was the case. seems you have another issue.
My router is running build r48151

(Last edited by JohnnySL on 29 Jan 2016, 19:16)

I guess it's not very stable though?

iletujestkont2 wrote:

I guess it's not very stable though?

i have an ea4500 which shares the identical hardware with e4200v2 and mine is running on the dd trunk snapshot march 20 build.  i find both wifi radios to be quite stable in the last 48 hours.

Linksys E4200v2 / EA4500
OpenWrt Designated Driver r49037 / LuCI Master (git-16.079.49121-355c213)

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