Yes, the Linksys WRT54G V5 Really Is a Lousy Router

[twinky]

Lately, when my Xbox 360 tries to connect to Xbox Live, I often lose my internet connection entirely. If I remove the WRT54G from the equation and simply connect the Xbox to my cable modem, I don't have this problem, but there's no point in having a router at all if I can't have multiple simultaneous internet connections.

I have the current firmware and have tried all manner of different administrative-type fixes, but to no avail.

 

[peskypescado]

Lately, when my Xbox 360 tries to connect to Xbox Live, I often lose my internet connection entirely. If I remove the WRT54G from the equation and simply connect the Xbox to my cable modem, I don't have this problem, but there's no point in having a router at all if I can't have multiple simultaneous internet connections.

I have the current firmware and have tried all manner of different administrative-type fixes, but to no avail.

What version of the WRT54G do you have? Basically pre or post V5? I would recommend updating your firmware to the latest version, make sure you have UPnP enabled, and add ports 88 and 3074 to your port triggering (not forwarding). After doing this you can check your Xbox Live connectivity on the system blade and it should report your NAT status to be open which is best for online games. The WRT54G is definitely Xbox Live compatible, I use two, one wireless router and the other a wireless bridge, to connect up my 360 and they work excellent.

 

[twinky]

I have a V5 with the latest firmware (1.00.9). UPnP is enabled. I reset it again today (without changing anything else) and it spontaneously started working again this afternoon. I added ports 88 and 3074 to the port triggering list; we'll see if it remains functional (and for how long).

Thanks for the advice!

 

[thiggins]

Interesting note from a reader:

http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-threads.cfm?f=82&g=57

Notice how Linksys products are attracting massive page views for their *MANY* problems? Thats an ISP help forum from actual users. They had to start a second thread for the WAG 2, it was too long for the servers to handle. The WAG 1 had a similar massive thread, in which I participated.

The issue is Linksys products burn out after 1-3 years of continuous usage, especially in warmer climates, due to severe and constant extreme thermal stress.

This is not something reviewers seem to test for - thermal stress. How about putting a temperature probe in a Linksys box, especially the integrated WAG DSL router product, and comparing it to other models, like the D-link 604-T based upon the same AR7 chipset? How much hotter does the WAG run?

I think it is disgusting people are having to tape fans onto their Linskys products to make them work, while others suffer premature failure, and see their hard earned cash wasted. Specifically see:

Linksys WAG54G v2, pt. 2
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=508557

WAG54G V2 heat issues FIXED
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=524626
http://www.users.on.net/~h_yeung/linksys_fan.jpg
http://www.users.on.net/~h_yeung/linksys_fan2.jpg
http://users.on.net/~teepingkoh/wag5.jpg
http://users.on.net/~teepingkoh/wag4.jpg
http://users.on.net/~teepingkoh/wag3.jpg
http://users.on.net/~teepingkoh/wag2.jpg
http://users.on.net/~teepingkoh/wag1.jpg

Its becoming a joke.

I think its about time Linksys was exposed for shipping the junk grade parts it does. I'm tired of seeing folks ripped off like this.

Thanks for your article on Linskys - it was great to see tomshardware.com getting back to the hard hitting, but fair, journalism we knew from you in the Van Smith days. I may start reading more frequently again......

 

[thiggins]

http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-threads.cfm?f=82&g=57

Notice how Linksys products are attracting massive page views for their *MANY* problems? Thats an ISP help forum from actual users. They had to start a second thread for the WAG 2, it was too long for the servers to handle. The WAG 1 had a similar massive thread, in which I participated.

It's not so much the "junk grade parts", as the basic thermal design, and perhaps the clock rates that the processors are run at.

Margins are very thin on consumer routers and manfs squeeze every cent they can of manufacturing cost out. This generally means no heat sinks, which would help thermal related issues. It would also help if case designs used some basic thermal design techniques such as enough holes/slots in the case for the required airflow and intelligent placement to allow air to flow across the hottest parts.

Bad thermal design isn't limited to Linksys. I'm looking at a brand-new draft 11n router that just came in from a well-known manufacturer that has lots of cooling slots on the bottom of the case, but one little row of slots on the top. The router has been idling all night and the top of the case is warm.

I'm by no means defending Linksys. But since it has such large market share, it will also generate a larger number of complains. And why, if Linksys products are so terrible, do people keep buying the products?

 

[peskypescado]

It's not so much the "junk grade parts", as the basic thermal design, and perhaps the clock rates that the processors are run at.

Margins are very thin on consumer routers and manfs squeeze every cent they can of manufacturing cost out. This generally means no heat sinks, which would help thermal related issues. It would also help if case designs used some basic thermal design techniques such as enough holes/slots in the case for the required airflow and intelligent placement to allow air to flow across the hottest parts.

Bad thermal design isn't limited to Linksys. I'm looking at a brand-new draft 11n router that just came in from a well-known manufacturer that has lots of cooling slots on the bottom of the case, but one little row of slots on the top. The router has been idling all night and the top of the case is warm.

I'm by no means defending Linksys. But since it has such large market share, it will also generate a larger number of complains. And why, if Linksys products are so terrible, do people keep buying the products?

The thermal design issue is complicated by the fact that they have for some time designed most of their products to be stackable. Well stackable in that they inter-connect somehow. However, stacking my WRT54G on top of my Linksys cable modem was a huge problem. The cable modem radiated so much heat that the bottom intake venting of the router was just taking in really hot exhaust from the cable modem. I have them side by side now and they both work great. I had to reboot the router almost weekly, especially in hot months.

The thermal designs have always been iffy on these products though. They are adequate if used properly, but many people put their routers in enclosed spaces, on their sides, behind their heater, I mean Prescott-based P4. They aren't the worst offender I have seen in this market though. My experience with Netgear is that they run much hotter. Mostly as a result of having basically zero ventilation holes/slots.

Honestly I think Linksys gets so many complaints because they sell so many routers. The number of complaints is a function of the number of devices sold and the defective. If they only sell one million of these per year and had only 1% were defective that is 10,000 units. Now add in forums on the web to post your gripes, and you find a very vocal minority. I am always skeptical of people who claim to have bought dozens of these and returned each one. Usually that is user error. You will find people with these stories for almost any popular product on Newegg's user reviews.

I have personally purchased about 2-3 dozen WRT54G's from v1 to v5 and including the GS and the GC. I have even run about 4 or 5 flavors of firmwares on them. I haven't had to return one. I wouldn't be surprised if I had to return one though, it happens in consumer electronics. But if these things were all just faulty as some say there is no way I would have avoided it.

 

[stunted]

my WRT54GL (v1) running DD-WRT v23 SP1 Final (05/16/06) mini reports[code:1:9a1d76f723]cat /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_conntrack_max
512[/code:1:9a1d76f723]My SmoothWall (which contrary to my previous post currently has 768MB of RAM) [code:1:9a1d76f723]cat /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_conntrack_max
48120[/code:1:9a1d76f723]512 is the default in the DD-WRT firmware (others use different values) but you can apparently bump this up to 4096 on a WRT54G with 16MB of RAM, that's all of them except the v5 and up (8MB) and pre v4 GS models (32MB).

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WRT54G for the specifications of various hardware revisions and http://www.utorrent.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=29569 for an excellent thread describing how to bump up your ip_conntrack_max, if that goes down I found a search for "DD-WRT ip_conntrack_max" and "WRT54G ip_conntrack_max" (without the quotes) most enlightening.

I'd still like to test them though.

Oh and on the subject of thermal design, I’ve found that standing them on their sides results in *better* cooling, (bigger surface area to create a convective current with) I also remember reading that the stackability of linksys products was for display purposes *only* and not something to do when the products were in use, (probably daft to have it but there we go) other things that can effect the heat are bumping up the radio output power, overclocking the CPU and restricting the airflow around the unit.

When it comes to increasing the radio output power I think a lot of people do this blindly without thinking of the consequences, in some circumstances (like in an old solidly built house or a modern high-rise building with lots on internal concrete walls) upping the output could increase reflection and potentially reduce the Signal to Noise Ratio, also it does nothing for the receive signal, which probably won’t get transmitted from the client at more than 100mW (linksys WRT54G family routers transmit at 28mW by default). In general it’s probably better to get a hi-gain antenna which I’ve seen in 7dB omni directional and up to 27dB directional varieties, these will boost the receive signal too.

OCing the CPU, well again, do you really need to, even at 300MHz it's not really suited to applications other than routing? It’s never going to make a kick ass web server (or whatever) so consider using something else, if you are going to OC it improve the cooling appropriately, I’m considering attaching an old chipset heatsync to the CPU as this can’t hurt (except you warranty) as long as you use a proper thermal adhesive, I don't OC and I intentionally run the DD-WRT mini version with most stuff turned off to keep the memory free for my routing table but the cooler it runs the longer it'll last.

 

[Dodger]

I've got the same problem. My server (an old ThinkPad!!!!!) doesn't work when I put it behind my crappy Linksys WRT54G router. So i am going to dig out my old non-wireless router (a D-Link DI-604) and use that. someone might ask "How do i get wireless with that?" I am going to daisy chain my linksys to my d-link, and hook my ThinkPad server to the d-link, and forward ports as appropriately.then i will hook the rest of my wired computers to the d-link and then hook my linksys to the d-link (just for wireless). So it will go like this: Cable Modem > Dlink > Linksys > Wireless Laptops
|____________________Other wired PC 's
|
ThinkPad Server

 

[peskypescado]

I've got the same problem. My server (an old ThinkPad!!!!!) doesn't work when I put it behind my crappy Linksys WRT54G router. So i am going to dig out my old non-wireless router (a D-Link DI-604) and use that.

How exactly does your "server" not work behind your WRT54G? What exactly are you serving up with it? Honestly I would be really surprised if a pre-V5 (or even a V5/V6) had trouble with some basic server operations. I have run a ton of different servers behind mine with no problem.

 

[Dodger]

A web server is what my thinkpad is, and i replaced my Linksys with a D-Link. Now people can ping my ip address, but i then found out that my isp doesn't allow web servers. if my isp allowed web servers, then my webpage would be online. So, Don't go and buy a Linksys WRT54G and expect it to let you have a server.

 

[stunted]

Some points.

1stly it’s hardly fair to blame Linksys for your ISP blocking http connections to your address.

2ndly try running your web server on a different port as they’re probably just blocking connections to port 80, then you give out your web address as mydyndns.homeip.net:81/bla/bla/bla/index.html (I’ve used 8080 and 81 in the past, be aware your router may use 8080 for remote admin) that should work, though some people behind super restrictive corporate firewalls may not be able to browse your site.

3rdly, when your contract is up, vote with your dollar and move ISP (be sure to ask any potential ISP if they block connections to port 80 first) and tell both your current ISP and the new one why you're moving, there’s no point going of in a huff if you don’t tell people why your doing it and preferably give them a chance to fix the problem.

 

[peskypescado]

A web server is what my thinkpad is, and i replaced my Linksys with a D-Link. Now people can ping my ip address, but i then found out that my isp doesn't allow web servers. if my isp allowed web servers, then my webpage would be online. So, Don't go and buy a Linksys WRT54G and expect it to let you have a server.

The reason people can't ping your IP is because of your WRT54G configuration, and it isn't necessarily a bad thing. People use pings to determine that there is a device attached to some IP address. If you don't respond to those pings, they won't know. You can easily host a webserver behind a WRT54G. It is as the previous poster mentioned, a problem with your ISP. A common thing to do is to change your website port to 8080 like he mentions. I have hosted far more complex things behind my WRT54G than an http server. It is up to the task. Some people have actually used their WRT54G as a webserver all by itself using a 3rd party firewall.

 

[fyrfyter]

Why is it that everyone is complaining about the v5 and not fixing it. If you have visited the DD-WRT link here, you can now hack the v5 and load on the DD-WRT firmware. http://www.bitsum.com/openwiking/owbase/ow.asp?WRT54G5%5FCFE

 

[peskypescado]

Why is it that everyone is complaining about the v5 and not fixing it. If you have visited the DD-WRT link here, you can now hack the v5 and load on the DD-WRT firmware. http://www.bitsum.com/openwiking/owbase/ow.asp?WRT54G5%5FCFE

DD-WRT does work great on the v5, but the flashing process is a little more involved than for a pre-v5. Certainly many regular users could brick their router with the new flashing procedure. I don't understand why Linksys would use vxWorks for a smaller memory footprint when Brainslayer (DD-WRT author) can fit DD-WRT into the same footprint with more features.

If anyone is having trouble with a v5 I would suggest they try DD-WRT. DD-WRT is the best thing to happen to WRT54G routers ever. I have started setting some up for friends to use a wireless bridges for their Xboxes. $50 for a v5 is a lot cheaper than Linksys wireless bridge or gaming adapter.

 

[stunted]

I don't understand why Linksys would use vxWorks for a smaller memory footprint when Brainslayer (DD-WRT author) can fit DD-WRT into the same footprint with more features.

This is what I love about the Open Source Hardware Hacking Community, their imagination and resourcefulness knows no bounds.

Linksys: "Err terribly sorry chaps, we know you've been having fun hacking our routers around, but we can't condone that sort of thing, it might cut into low end Cisco sales, also it goes against the prevailing attitude that you don't *own* an electronic device you buy, you've just, sort of, bought the right to *use* it, and the DMCA says you're not allowed to take it apart, sort of, so we're going to put a stop to it, we've found a way that will do that, and save $0.001 per unit in manufacturing cost to justify the change, best of all, we only have to pay half the saving to a third party in licensing fees, which is like totally way better than paying nothing to that wooly liberal open source lot."

OSHHC: "Whatever"

Linksys: "no really, we've gutted it, we've taken out half the RAM and Flash memory so we can only just fit this shiny tiny vxworks kernel on it, *and* we've locked down the boot loader so you'll never get anything else on it even if you could make it fit," <fx>holds little finger up to corner of mouth and mwahaahaas</fx>

OSHHC: "What like this you mean"

Linksys: "Oh"
disclaimer: Those aren't real quotes and I have know idea why Linksys really changed the hardware spec, that is satire intended to highlight the impressive work of DD-WRT and others.

If anyone is having trouble with a v5 I would suggest they try DD-WRT. DD-WRT is the best thing to happen to WRT54G routers ever. I have started setting some up for friends to use a wireless bridges for their Xboxes. $50 for a v5 is a lot cheaper than Linksys wireless bridge or gaming adapter.

I'd still say given the choice get a WRT45Gv4 or a GL, or even better get an Asus WL500G deluxe, it has 32MB of ram and a couple of USB2 ports to which you can attach printers, hard drives, webcams or nothing, if it's an Internet facing device I wouldn't connect anything, but use the extra ram to support more concurrent connections, if like me you need more than one access point, you could unload the Internet router even more by flashing it with DD-WRT mini or micro and running all the extra services (DHCP, FTP, SMB, whatever) on the internal non-internet facing one.

I think the Linksys WRTSL54GS is same as the Asus WL500G deluxe, but the Asus has been available much longer and I'm a firm believer in letting other people iron out the kinks of early adoption.

 

[odsantos]

Hi,

I have bought in less than one week one of those routers. In fact I live in Luanda, Angola - Africa, and there is not much choice here, so I had to buy this one as it was the only one in the shop.

I made my graduation in IT, and frankly although I have been working with computers since 1980s, I am happy with this industry evolution and I seldom saw such a poor working device - it is appalling. Today I had to try and upgrade the firmware from v1.00.1 to v1.00.9 to seek for better performance.

It keeps loosing the internet connection to the modem cable frequently, and I have to power it off and on to reestablish it. I have a Compaq 1.7Ghz 512MB Windows XP Pro desktop and a HP 1.2Ghz 256MB Windows XP Home laptop in my home network and for now I am only using the wired features of the router (I disabled the wireless one) and if one computer looses the network access to the other usually it also looses the internet connection, such a strange behaviour. Also the 'repair' button of the NIC connection to the internet did not work on the previous firmware version, it does now after the upgrade - I do hope that with it the intermitent internet problems will be over, and that I can finally rely on this router.

All of this on just less than a week.

Osvaldo

 

[ve3vdc]

User forums around the web have been abuzz with complaints about the non-Linux version of one of Linksys' most popular products. Tim Higgins tested it and the WRT54GL Linux-based version and found at least one reason why the V5 has so many unhappy buyers.

This router not only has unhappy buyers... it has unhappy neighbours too!

I am a ham radio operator who lives next to one of these nightmares. Since my neighbour put his online at the beginning of September 2006 I have been practically shut down by the noise and interference it's causing across a very wide slice of the VHF spectrum.

See this article on my website for full details...
www.start.ca/users/ldblake/netproblem.htm

I've probed several other makes of routers with my equipment, the same way I did the Linksys. All of them make some noise but for the most part it's gone by the time my antenna is a foot or two away. This wireless-g router can actually be heard half a block down the street.

Various ham forums are abuzz with dislike of this equipment. Some are even talking about filing FCC and Industry Canada complaints about them.

See these threads to get the idea...
http://www.eham.net/articles/8302
http://www.eham.net/forums/RFI/361

So I'm not even a linksys customer and I already have reason to never buy any of their products.

 

[pswit]

My v5 worked ok for about 2 weeks and then it would stop routing (not a useful feature) so Linksys replaced it with another v5. All of their firmware worked for a day or two and then you needed to reboot it, so I said it can't hurt to try the dd-wrt, so I upgraded my v5 to the dd-wrt micro, the install was pretty simple all seemed well and then I tried to actually use the router its still useless! High packet loss, it even caused my cable modem to reboot constantly. This is one of the worst pieces of hardware I have ever seen. It's back to my old D-Link until I can get out and buy something on Tom's list of useful routers.

Thanks for letting me vent!


pswit