Posted: Thu Nov 01, 2007 22:17 Post subject: RC4 issues WRT54G v8
Hi everyone, I've been joining #DD-WRT on Freenode for the past few days wondering if I should (complain? or ask) about a problem I'm having with my Linksys WRT54G v8. No one has been responding so I decided to post here ... please try not to criticize me or flame me for "not searching" - I've tried, but there's so many topics irrelevant to my issue. The problem: I recently noticed it [My WRT54G v8] was finally supported (which is why I bought it in the first place!) but was disappointed when I found out (after I broke the router trying to put DD-WRT RC4 on it) that I had the EON flash chip that no one knew about when RC4 came out. Using my laptop I downloaded a user-made update (by Tornado?) that fixed the issue (so I could save settings now) but now it seems that I'm laggy, webpages load slowly at the beginning of turning my computer on, and if I open a lot of Youtube video tabs (or just high bandwidth content) I seem to lag out a little bit, and sometimes the router even resets! (My eggdrop on IRC also pings out a LOT more) Why does this occur? And is it normal to have only 300-700 kB (around there) of free memory? I'm not sure... I know this is only a release candidate and that the WRT54G v8 was JUST supported, but would I just be better off trying to get the original firmware back on? Thanks
Joined: 02 Nov 2007 Posts: 3 Location: New England, USA
Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 1:03 Post subject:
I cant understand your problem too much but i can relieve one of your worries. The memory is supposed to be low like that. Too increase it a little, uncheck any boxes mentioning utilizing NVRAM or something like that. But still, ive seen my memory go as low as 284KB and its worked out fine. And what do u mean by the EON flash chip. My WRT54Gv8 works perfectly fine with ddwrt. If you could explain how your router is different than my WRT54G it would help out a lot.
What I mean is, I heard a lot of people talking about my issue when I first flashed my router (which was that settings were not being saved) the cause of this was a new flash chip that was not discovered (I guess the WRT54G that the coder(s) got to test had the "normal" flash chip, but I was a lucky one with this funky flash chip that acts differently. That is why settings could not be saved. I downloaded a fixed firmware from Tornado (I think I have the latest, it's hard to see through all 49 pages without spending a lot of time). I don't think these instability issues are due to the flash chip though, I think it is just DD-WRT bugs. I'm really not sure.
Joined: 04 Jan 2007 Posts: 11564 Location: Wherever the wind blows- North America
Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 1:09 Post subject:
I'm not a V8 guy but one thing that helps with low memory Linksys units is to go to the Administration page and set the Max Port to 1024 and TCP/UDP timeouts to 90.
Give it a try and see if it helps.
redhawk _________________ The only stupid question....is the unasked one.
Maximum Ports is currently set to 512. I assume this is an even better setting?
I'm not sure though if I would want to change the TCP/UDP timeout though. I kinda like to know what I'm doing before I do it. Would there be any adverse affects?
Joined: 04 Jan 2007 Posts: 11564 Location: Wherever the wind blows- North America
Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 1:18 Post subject:
The ports are the number of active open ports.....the timeouts is how long the router will wait before releasing "old" connectionis.
Typically, the Max ports would be best set to MAX 4096...but on low memory devices 1024 is adiquate....the best setting for the timeouts is generally lower then the defaults...I have all my units set to 4096/90/90...except the low memory units 1024/90/90
Read the wiki for more info on these settings
redhawk _________________ The only stupid question....is the unasked one.
Joined: 04 Jan 2007 Posts: 11564 Location: Wherever the wind blows- North America
Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 1:38 Post subject:
Hardly a GURU at this stuff....get to 500 posts and you can be too.
Free Memory on these units with 8M ram is generally in the 300-600K range.
Don't worry too much about it. See if the 1024/90/90 helps long term. If not post back. Maybe someone with more experience on the GSv7 and Gv8's can help.
The settings I am mentioning are common among all Brands/models.
redhawk _________________ The only stupid question....is the unasked one.
Yeah I'd update to that...I have the same router / as you do... micro & just installed dd-wrt for the first time... set the max ports to 4096 & timeouts to 86400 what can i say? I'm a heavy p2p user I haven't got kicked offline or disconnected from my IRC bouncer either.
Thanks a lot guys,
I think I flashed it correctly (following the instructions)
"Firmware: DD-WRT v24 RC-4 (10/10/07) micro"
Are the settings going to reset every time the firmware is updated? I guess it's a good thing I remember all of them anyway.
I'm not sure if this firmware will help but I'm always up for upgrading to the latest to get bug fixes, so I'll see how this goes.
I have a WRT54G V3(new purchase from Craigs, $20), WRT54G V1, WRT54G V5, and WRT54G V8.
the V3, V1 and V8 are all running V24 RC4, the V5 is staying on V23 SP2 until V24 goes Stable (my V5 HATES the current V24 RC4 for whatever reason)
I have to say, the V8 is way more harsh with the WRT firmware then the V5 is. Seems the V8 uses more Memory, Has slower CPU cycles(takes longer to dump TCP resets), and likes to Bog down alot when you have alot of traffic (6Megs+) going through it.
Personally, I only use my V8 as a Wireless Bridge. It seems thats the only way I can use the V8 with out having any issues at all.
With the V8 in Normal Mode, expect to see about 340k-580k memory free ( it will always fluctuate between those numbers, but shouldn't go below 340K)
Expect it to Bomb when you open Bit torrent with more then 280 Global Connections (EVEN if you set the router to allow 1024+ Connections, it still does it)
Oh and never (and i mean NEVER!) use the bandwidth Graph. It WILL crash the V8(Crashes all routers with 2/8 running Micro, but seems to crash my V8 more then the V5).
Though, other then above, if you can deal with that, the V8 isn't all that bad. But I would suggest keeping the V8 only for a WiFi appliance, such as a Wireless Repeater, or Wireless Bridge, and get yourself a V1-4 WRT for your Gateway.
Joined: 02 Nov 2007 Posts: 3 Location: New England, USA
Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 21:39 Post subject:
jmounts79 wrote:
I have a WRT54G V3(new purchase from Craigs, $20), WRT54G V1, WRT54G V5, and WRT54G V8.
the V3, V1 and V8 are all running V24 RC4, the V5 is staying on V23 SP2 until V24 goes Stable (my V5 HATES the current V24 RC4 for whatever reason)
I have to say, the V8 is way more harsh with the WRT firmware then the V5 is. Seems the V8 uses more Memory, Has slower CPU cycles(takes longer to dump TCP resets), and likes to Bog down alot when you have alot of traffic (6Megs+) going through it.
Personally, I only use my V8 as a Wireless Bridge. It seems thats the only way I can use the V8 with out having any issues at all.
With the V8 in Normal Mode, expect to see about 340k-580k memory free ( it will always fluctuate between those numbers, but shouldn't go below 340K)
Expect it to Bomb when you open Bit torrent with more then 280 Global Connections (EVEN if you set the router to allow 1024+ Connections, it still does it)
Oh and never (and i mean NEVER!) use the bandwidth Graph. It WILL crash the V8(Crashes all routers with 2/8 running Micro, but seems to crash my V8 more then the V5).
Though, other then above, if you can deal with that, the V8 isn't all that bad. But I would suggest keeping the V8 only for a WiFi appliance, such as a Wireless Repeater, or Wireless Bridge, and get yourself a V1-4 WRT for your Gateway.
I've had a similar problem with the bandwith before, my connection is also 6Mbps. Whenever i opened uTorrent or Ares, I would have to keep them open. Otherwise, the router would pretty much block all network access. But for some reason the other PCs in my house would still have access. Every time this happened I would have to reset my modem and the v8 and it would get fixed again. Then one day I got seriously pissed at the v8 and I went into the firmware and changed something (I can't remember what) and its never done it to me again. I will try to figure out the setting that I changed but i dont know how/if it will make a difference on EON models. As for the bandwith monitor and other problems (long CPU cycles,etc.) I havent experienced those ever. Maybe once in a while the router would crash if I changed to many settings on a screen, but this is only an RC frimware so I'm sure that will be fixed.
And Justin, I just read about the EON-Samsung difference on that link and I think that it erases itself not because of the flashing process but because thats one of the side effects of the EON chip. Some people reported that they would lose their settings anytime they unplugged their router. The only short term solution I have is to go to the administration tab and backup your settings just in case. Also, having low memory wont make that great of a difference except if your using P2P and you have a lot of IP connections. Turn off the Client lease assigned by NVRAM setting and any problem arising from high bandwith will go away. Speaking of P2P, if you are using it, keep your TCP timeout and UDP timeouts lower than the default settings. This might fix your IRC problem if you still encounter it (I'm not sure, I am not an expert in router physics).
Thanks for all the replies.
Most of the issues seem to be fixed, although my eggdrop still pings off a lot. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to buy *another* new router this year when I get the money, apparently this one just isn't going to cooperate. Hopefully the next one I buy isn't a v8. (Though I'm considering going with a WRT54GL).
I mainly use the router just for me and my server cabled, and then the other 4 computers in the house use wireless. I don't torrent at all (Kinda stinks to know that when I do it won't work well)
what can i say? I'm a heavy p2p user I haven't got kicked offline or disconnected from my IRC bouncer either.