[HowTo] Upgrading RAM to 128 MB (WL-500gP, WL-500W and WL-700gE)

[tcharron]

I tried to upgrade my wl500gp v1 to 128m using this guide.

I salvaged some chips from an SDRAM board (Nanya 32x16).

I installed U3 successfully and ran memtest against it overnight with no errors.

I installed U4, and after some solder touchups it booted fine. I configured the settings for 128m and rebooted and it came up. Memtest ran up to test 14 and then reported an error. It had a total of 3 errors after the first iteration.

I shut it down to touch up my joints and haven't been able to get it boot since. I can only assume that bad joints are causing the problem. I will get some flux and have another go at it (I installed without the use of flux the first time). Any other tips?

[tcharron]

An update...

I picked up some solder paste. I was surprised that the local shop here (Active Surplus in Toronto) didn't have plain flux, but I think that the paste worked better for me.

Without removing the chips, I smeared some paste on the U4 contacts and just heated each solder joint. This worked well -- I could hear the flux burning off and could see the solder flowing into the joints. Under magnification, the joints looked a lot better after this process

Of course, it still didn't boot. SO, despite my certainty that U3 was working well (see my prior post) I gave the same treatment to U3 and lo and behold everything worked after that. I used SCP to get memtest onto the router (this was far easier than configuring the router connected to the internet) and will run memtest next.

So, a $3 tin of solder paste was the solution and I have about $2.99 of it left to spare. Cool!

[vuk]

Hi there people !
This might be mostly adressed to Oleg...
I tried to apply the instruction from this oleg`s tutorial. But i DID NOT (stupid me ) aplied

nvram set sdram_init=0x000b
nvram set sdram_config=0x0032
nvram commit
halt

before every chip exchange, neither upgrading to 128Mb aware firmware.
Now, after purely replacing chips and soldering 33ohm to R43, the router seem to be bricked as power led is off, wifi led is half-lit barely observable, and the switch section works ok, leds on, etc. Of course, the router does not boot .
Is this a matter of PIN9 trick (i did it once succesfuly) or i have to replace with old chips, remove r43, and take the job from begining again ?

Looking forward for an sugestion..

Vuk

[tenho]

Hi folks,

can you imagine, that this RAM mod could also work for other routers. I have one Buffalo WHR-HP-G54 with only 16MB of RAM, so it would be great applying this RAM mod to my router too. (Even though I was successfully been able to make the "SD mod" on my router and now it's possible to SWAP ON some space on the installed SD card which is limited only by the free SD card space, but you can figure out, that this is not the everfastest RAM upgrade possible ).

I'm sorry to place this post in the wrong forum, but I came across this 128MB RAM mod and found it highly interesting!

Can somebody give me a hint, what to pay attention for?
Here you can see inside the router, if this helps. And here is the backside of the board (where the RAM is soldered). Here are the tech. specs of the RAM chip.

I'll appreciate any advise!

Cheers,
tenho

[RolF2]

Hi folks,

can you imagine, that this RAM mod could also work for other routers. I have one Buffalo WHR-HP-G54 with only 16MB of RAM, so it would be great applying this RAM mod to my router too. (Even though I was successfully been able to make the "SD mod" on my router and now it's possible to SWAP ON some space on the installed SD card which is limited only by the free SD card space, but you can figure out, that this is not the everfastest RAM upgrade possible ).

I'm sorry to place this post in the wrong forum, but I came across this 128MB RAM mod and found it highly interesting!

Can somebody give me a hint, what to pay attention for?
Here you can see inside the router, if this helps. And here is the backside of the board (where the RAM is soldered). Here are the tech. specs of the RAM chip.

I'll appreciate any advise!

Cheers,
tenho

http://www.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtop...ight=hpg54+ram

R.

[tenho]

...
Testing device memory
Type these lines to start testing:

cd /tmp
wget http://oleg.wl500g.info/bin/memtest
chmod +x memtest
./memtest 16m

Would this test also work on any router running DD-WRT/OpenWRT/FreeWRT (sorry, it's not Olegs Firmware)? Just wanting to test the memory after overclocking the router...

Greetz,
Stefan

[tenho]

I'll answer myself:
The memtest is running quite well on Buffalo WHR-HP-G54 with default 16 MB RAM and DD-WRT v24 vpn. But you should replace ./memtest 16m with ./memtest 5m (6m could be also OK, just try). Otherwise it will hang up.

Just putty into the router and run this:

cd /tmp
wget http://oleg.wl500g.info/bin/memtest
chmod +x memtest
./memtest 5m

The first run is finished in about 10 minutes or so.

For the folks with SDmod: don't run the test with your SD card swapped on (swap space with a swap file on the card)! This will mess up the contents of the card and make it unreadable. Unswap first instead!

/opt/bin/busybox swapoff /mmc/myswap.swp

Then run the FREE command in order to see, if the swap space was successfully unswapped.

I have optware with busybox installed and the SDmod on my router. If this interferes with the memtest: no idea. If you don't have busybox installed, just try the memtest though.

Cheerz,
Stefan

[Pim Borst]

After finishing the upgrade to 128MB about two weeks ago I thought I should write an update.

I am really glad I got it working. Several times I thought the machine was bricked.
My soldering skills definately were not good enough for the job.

The main problem was that I could not remove enough lead-free solder from the BCP.
This caused short circuits underneath the chip so I had to remove it again...
That ruined a soldering pad on the PCB.
Fortunately I could make a bypass with a small wire to one of the resistors next to the chip.

Another problem was loose pins.
Some pins did not touch the PCB because of the bumps of the remaining lead-free solder.
You should check the connections really well with a multi meter.

The data lines can easily be measured between the pins and the resistors next to the chips.
Address, clock, powr and some other lines between pins with the same number from U3 and U4.
You can also apply some physical pressure to the pins to see if they wiggle, but be careful because you do not want them to bend.
The loose pins were fixed by applying tiny amounts of soldering paste and reheating (see post #36).

When the connections are good and the router boots (leds will go out after a second or so) run the memtest.
Also, tap on the router while running the test and see that it does not freeze and does not give memory errors.

Some other points

• The 22 ohm resistor from the Transcend SODIMM module is a little bigger than the ones on the router, but it just fits.
• The Hynix chips work stable with the capacitor from the back-side of the module connected to the two clock lines (see post #38 by NotebookKiller).

I also did some other small mods: soldered header pins for the serial ports and added two extra USB ports.
These USB ports are internal, the 500W does not have room left on the back side.
I put in a 16GB flash drive which holds optware and user data. No need for swap with 128MB!

As a last point I would like to mention another option for a great mod:
The WL500W has soldering isles and holes in the PCB to connect a PCMCIA connector!

• Has anyone tried to connect a PCMCIA card to the router? Did it work?
• If I connected a SATA card and a SATA HDD, would that speedup the transfer rates compared to a USB drive? I have read several times that 2MB/sec is about the max with USB but why is that? Is that a hardware or a driver issue?

Please post responses in http://wl500g.info/showthread.php?t=19164

And finally I would give a big thank you to Oleg, the other posters of this thread and to Marc who has lend me his soldering equipment. I am really happy with my super-router.

[CsBubo]

Small contribution, but hope it will help some:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUpHA_ZarDg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2vnJyRuq98

So, I did a few upgrades recently, and for the ones who would like to try it, I have some tips:

Use Wood's metal, it's cheap and will do the trick, You can perform the upgrade with the simpliest iron available next door. Also use the finest wick available, it will suck the excess solder like hell. And flux massively!

You can check Your unit before, if it is using 22 or 33 ohm resistors. Just to have them aligned. Not sure if it counts or not.

Although the memtest utility can pin half of the memory for the first run, what You can do is to start in one session with 64m, next session with 32m, next with 16m and You're there, almost all You're new memory is tested fully.
ELPIDA D5116ADTA chips are also fine for the upgrade!!

For Vuk: I had the same symptoms, recheck all Your soldering, especially the resistor/s and of course all the pins for shorts to the neighbours. And even if You have FW which isn't capable to handle 128, You can use the tftp method to flash a new one. So no panic, it'll work.

Thanks to Oleg, and all the contributors here!

[Pim Borst]

Small contribution, but hope it will help some:

Thanks! It would have helped me I have saved the videos for my next upgrade!

[Gabs86]

hello, i have make the 128mb upgrade one month ago, and today my router dies when i plug my hard drive to the router . I try to load the oleg firmware again, now it´s bricked. I try to do pin-9 trick, but it doesn´t work.

What can i do?

Thanks and sorry for my bad english.

[dronchik14]

Guys,

Please don't try 64Mx8 - it doesn't work!

I thought that BCM5354 could support , also I checked A11 - connected, but no chance...

Looking for the known supported chip.

[Robek]

Hi All,
I'm new on your forum. I got many help from your forums but now I have a problem that I can not solve.
I bought a Ram modul with K4H511638B-TCCC chips.
This chip similar to TCB3 but 400MHz and the CAS is 3 not 2,5.
I changed the two ram chip in my WL500Gp V1 router. Ramtest shows no error. It semms to be OK.
But after I upgraded the router of my friend the memtest always shows error.

Here is the log:

Current limits:
RLIMIT_RSS 0x7fffffff
RLIMIT_VMEM 0x7fffffff
Raising limits...
Allocated 67108864 bytes...trying mlock...success. Starting tests...

Testing 67108864 bytes at 0x10006000 (0 bytes lost to page alignment).

Run 1:
Test 1: Stuck Address: Setting...Passed.
Test 2: Random value: Setting...Testing...Passed.
Test 3: XOR comparison: Setting...Testing...Passed.
Test 4: SUB comparison: Setting...Testing...Passed.
Test 5: MUL comparison: Setting...Testing...Passed.
Test 6: DIV comparison: Setting...Testing...Passed.
Test 7: OR comparison: Setting...Testing...Passed.
Test 8: AND comparison: Setting...Testing...Passed.
Test 9: Sequential Increment: Setting...Testing...Passed.
Test 10: Solid Bits: Setting...Passed.
Test 11: Block Sequential: Setting...Passed.
Test 12: Checkerboard: Setting...Passed.
Test 13: Bit Spread: Setting...Passed.
Test 14: Bit Flip: Setting...
FAILURE: 0x00100000 != 0x00000000 at offset 0x00002f6e.
Skipping to next test...
Test 15: Walking Ones: Setting...Passed.
Test 16: Walking Zeroes: Setting...Passed.
Run 1 completed in 2867 seconds (1 tests showed errors).
munlock'ed memory.
1 runs completed. 1 errors detected. Total runtime: 2867 seconds.

I try capacitor form 3pF to 7pF but always stops at this address.
If I enable only 64MB with sdram_init=0x0013 the ramtest not shows error.
It means the U3 chip OK. I replaced the U4 with an another chip but the symtom is the same.

Could you help me?
Thank you!

Sorry for my poor English.

[Robek]

Hi all,
I think the firmware was old to handle correct the 128MB.
Updated then it works find.

If somebody use this chip use sdram_config=0062 because it has CL=3.

Rgds,

[tmsulica]

Hy guys , if somebody know where to fin this memory modules in Romania , can you help me ?


thanks