WL-500g Premium died After Upgrading Firmware

[pinkfloyd]

2 days ago I installed the latest firmware from dd-wrt to try Kai with my psp....everything was working fine except Kai...Today I rebooted the router from the web and after it rebooted I have no connections at all.....

I tried both wireless and Lan and nothing


Tried to restore back to Oleg but when I press restore button the power button does not flicker...router lights up normally but no connection at all

I think my only solution might be the pin9 hardware thing but after I opened my wl500gp I found out that the image that was posted on this forum is different to my internal router diagram

Please help

UPDATE: pin 9 did the trick. My problem is now that login and password dont seem to match and I cant enter neither via telnet nor the web interface to clear the ram...btw I installed oleg back again

[pripps]

Try failsafe mode as described in open wrt wiki for Asus. I was in the same situation as you and it helped me. But the restore button worked in my case.

[wasakima]

I read some of the threads in the forum, but cannot seem to find anything on how to groung the pins. I believe my WL-500gP is bricked (used ddwrt FW, then enabled JFFS for USB support, said to click Apply buttom, but click Save as not recommended, not not working and cannot connect to it), and I think grounding the pin 9 might do the trick. But what is the best way to do this?

[aka]

Problem:
If I plug in the power and start pinging, it responds to ping:

Hardware error.
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=3ms TTL=100
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=3ms TTL=100
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=3ms TTL=100
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=3ms TTL=100
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=3ms TTL=100
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=3ms TTL=100
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=3ms TTL=100
Request timed out.

sometimes it starts answering once every 3-4 pings

Hardware error.
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=3ms TTL=100
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=3ms TTL=100
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=3ms TTL=100
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=5ms TTL=100
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=3ms TTL=100

I tried to put it in recovery mode - but it doesn't answer to ping, after I release the recovery button, the power led stops flashing after the first ping attempt.
What I tried:
I opened it up and I think I correctly grounded PIN 9...
No luck .

Any ideas?
Do you guys have any advice?

[OncleOh]

Hi,i have one WL-500gP dead after upgrade, now only lan led light power and air lead are dead. Tried pin9 solution but no succes. Any idea on how to repair it?

Regards!
Leo

[lly]

After which upgrade? RAM? USB? console? firmware?
Have you tried firmware restoration by tftp?
If it happens directly after hardware modification - seems to be you broke something.

We even don't know your firmware version... So, without detailed information, nobody can help you.

[OncleOh]

It happend after upgrate to linux firmware via asus recovery tool. Did not do any hardware modifications.

Regards!
Leo

[lly]

Try to recover it by TFTP.
Detailed process information from Oleg (translated from russian):
Firmware Restoration äëÿ WL500gP/W/gP v2/gx, WL520g/gU/gC, WL550gE/WL320gE/gP

P.S. OncleOh, once more - if you don't want to post detailed information (FW version, etc.), nobody will help you.

[Brickmeister]

Hi,

This is one fine mess I've got myself into.
I attempted to flash the firmware of my ASUS WL500G Premium, and it seemed to work but there was something wrong with my nvram settings, so in an effort to start again I believe I've cleared my nvram settings and now I have no IP address to flash further images to.

Can anyone help or have I well and truly bricked it :S ?

Thanks for your time.

Edit: I guess I should add some more details.
The really big problems started when I flashed the router with wl500g-clear-nvram.trx, planning to later flash it with wl500g-recover.trx, however as I understand it the premium doesn't reset to a default but uses the setting in nvram which I just cleared. D'oh! I can get it into what appears to be diag mode, with the power light flashing slowly. Otherwise the power light is solid. It seems no other lights are lighting no matter what is plugged in where.

[newbiefan]

I would install a serial connector (max232 with 3,3V) and have a closer look for the boot messages.

[ozluis]

Hi all, first sorry for my english.

Now the problem: I try to upgrade Firmware in my Asus, and program stopped during it. And now I can't connect to router to clean nvram or anything else. only AIR led is shines lightly...

Pin 9 trick, doesn't work...
Do You know what to do? Maybe someone has got answer for this problem...
please, help me

[raas]

reset the device a couple off times,
then try to connect.

[ozluis]

This will not give anything, router does not react on such interventions. I wonder or under COM cable can delete nvram??

[Inertial]

Hello!

Well is your router really non-responsive? No reply to ping, not possible to enter recovery mode by pressing reset button during power up, no signs of life on port0 over serial, etc? If so I happened to have a unit given by a friend, in the same condition, CFE (the bootloader) got corrupted so nothing really happens to the router. pin 9 gave nothing either... maybe there is a solution to this but it's a bit hardcore: 'will try it for the router I was given anyway... remove the flash chip, re-program it externally, and then resolder it. I know it's risky and complicated but I haven't come across to any other solution...

On the other hand, if you manage to connect over serial cable to port0 and manage to get to see the booting sequence, pressing ctrl+c while the router listens for tftp connection attempts, gets you to the CFE prompt. From there you can follow the instructions given somewhere in the forum by Oleg, on how to erase all nvram variables and on how to proceed then. The bad thing is that when you are able to do this, it means you can get the power led to flash (ie enter recovery mode) which doesn't seems to be our case.

Reaching to tftp by itself doesn't always means you are saved, since it's mentioned in the forums that if you have corrupted or incompatible (compared to what the recovery firmware expects) nvram variable values, the firmware download and re-flashing over tftp doesn't complete successfully.

Been on the fourth modded unit, I have to admit that while things advance relatively easy when no errors occur, it gets quite difficult to recover when something turns bad...

In other words it's all fine as long as all goes well, but in case of trouble you really need all the equipment, knowledge and technique you can get, to recover.

Lately I realised that hardware interventions to the router are inherently risky... I happened to know how to proceed and have some of the needed equipment, so it feels quite feasible to do, but I have also seen damaged hardware as a result of over-enthusiastic attempts to modding.

The above is said in order to prevent people who are not at ease with smd rework and external flash programmers to end up in a worst mess then they began with. (lifted pads, damaged tracks, corrupted flashes, electrically or thermally fried chips, etc.) Flash chip being too close to the cpu's bga, bga's being known of not being particularilly forgivefull...

Still I’ll try to proceed this way if I can't come up with any better idea and if no one can advise me on a better solution.

So here it comes:

wl500gp with Oleg's firmware v.10 (latest as of may 2008) with 128MB mod:
I was connected over serial to the CFE console, then something happened, the router freezes, when I re-apply power, nothing (my guess is that the router froze while the flash was in an inconsistent state). Not even CFE prompt, no power light blinking, no ping, not a single character emitted over serial, no nothing (only lan lights flash all together, and then they turn off, only to light again if a lan cable is connected to the corresponding port). Tried pin 9 trick several times, while connected over serial to monitor things, nothing...

I've spend days (weeks) looking in the translated versions of the Russian forum (where most of the information wealth resides ) but still nothing.

Does any one can tell me: is my fear that once CFE gets corrupted, pin 9 trick doesn't work any more, correct?

If so externally re-flashing might be the last hope...

Inertial

[kolp]

So I went away for holiday and just returned 2 weeks later to find I had not internet. So I thought it wasn't a big deal thought it was the company. I decided to try after an hour and realized that I couldn't even log into the router. So I hooked directly from the internet through the machine and it worked. So I know that router has a problem. So I resetted with the button and still no go. And I got it in restore mode and uploaded the new firmware from asus still nothin happened. So now what should I do I pretty tried everything. I read another forum that said if I was able to png my router I was able to do that to. But I don't know why I cant log onto it. Any suggestions guys thanks in advance