how to flash a ddwrt router to worldspot firmware

[marcoind]

Hi,
I have a TPlink WR741ND flashed with ddwrt.
What is the procedure to flash it with the worldspot firmware (openwrt)?
I try without success from the ddwrt gui.
thanks

[WorldSpot]

Hello

What is your exact hardware version?
Which file did you try? (Full URL please)
I think the sysupgrade version should work from ddwrt

[marcoind]

Hi,
It's a TL-WR741ND ver 4.24
I have try the file openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v1-squashfs-factory
downloaded from:
http://worldspot.net/wsf/ar71xx/openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v1-squashfs-factory.bin

about sysupgrade should i try in ssh from ddwrt the following :

cd /tmp/
wget http://worldspot.net/wsf/ar71xx/openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v1-squashfs-factory.bin
sysupgrade openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v1-squashfs-factory.bin


thanks

[WorldSpot]

Your wr741nd is a v4.24, so you should use a v4 firmware like this one:
http://dl.worldspot.net/wsbeta/14.07-20160229-1/ar71xx-std/openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v4-squashfs-sysupgrade.bin

[marcoind]

Hi
i just try the
http://dl.worldspot.net/wsbeta/14.07-20160229-1/ar71xx-std/openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v4-squashfs-sysupgrade.bin
from ddwrt firmware upgrade menu in the webgui interface.
same problem.
after selecting the file, there is a count down of 297s that stop after less than 10s then the router reboot with the same ddwrt version.
should i do it via telnet or tftp instead ?
thanks

[WorldSpot]

Maybe you should try the factory version, then flash by ssh, maybe you will get an appropriate error message?
It is possible that there is not enough memory to flash with the gui.

If you have tftp bootloader working, it is even better.

[marcoind]

i try to flash it via ssh by doing the following

cd /tmp
wget http://dl.worldspot.net/wsbeta/14.07-20160229-1/ar71xx-std/openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v4-squashfs-factory.bin
md5sum openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v4-squashfs-factory.bin
write openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v4-squashfs-factory.bin linux

the reply from ddwrt was:
openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v4-squashfs-factory.bin: Bad trx header

i did the same try with openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v4-squashfs-sysupgrade.bin
same problem....


maybe i should try to re flash with original lynksys firmware but i don't know how to do that.....

[WorldSpot]

It looks like it wants a trx file
Googling shows that it should be possible to convert bin to trx
However I haven't tested it:
https://wiki.openwrt.org/doc/hardware/soc/soc.broadcom.bcm47xx/image.conversion

[marcoind]

I try the method described at https://wiki.openwrt.org/doc/hardware/soc/soc.broadcom.bcm47xx/image.conversion
it unfortunately doesn't work
after the command
dd if=openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v4-squashfs-factory.bin bs=32 skip=1 of=openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v4-squashfs-factory.trx

i have
122879+0 records in
122879+0 records out

records out should be 32 byte smaller than records in.
the command hd is not implemented in dwrt so the next command
hd /tmp/openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-wr741nd-v4-squashfs-factory.trx | head
doesn't work.
i have the same bad trx header when i try to write the trx file.

i will try to flash it with the tplink firmware. i just need to find the good procedure. there is lot of post regarding this on the web and are a lot confusing.
any recommendation to flash back from ddwrt to the original tp link firmware ?

thanks

[WorldSpot]

this blog seems suggests to revert to factory firmware before flashing openwrt:

https://samhobbs.co.uk/2013/11/switch-from-dd-wrt-to-openwrt-in-under-30-minutes

http://www.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=85237

[marcoind]

hi
The solution above worked.
back to original firmware then flash with openwrt.

thanks