[wplug] OpenWRT vs. DD-WRT vs. stock

[Patrick Wagstrom]

Michael H. Semcheski wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> I've got a Linksys 54G (an early enough model that its effectively a GL).
> 
> It was working fine, until about four months ago.  At that time, my 
> girlfriend's iBook stopped connecting to it reliably. 
> Then, two weeks or so ago, my Thinkpad started having trouble. 
> I pulled up NetStumbler, and my wireless router seems to be 
> inconsistent.  Its hard to explain, but what's notable is that rebooting 
> it (via unplugging and replugging its power) fixes it, if only temporarily.
> 
> Rebooting should not have much affect if its working correctly, in my 
> opinion.  It leads me to believe that there is some faulty hardware.  
> Its about two and a half years, so I'm neither shocked nor appalled.
> 
> So here's my question:
> 
> I installed OpenWRT (White Russian) on it when it was relatively new.  
> I've been about as happy with it as could be expected.  Some problems 
> with DHCP, but there are other things that might be to blame.  Largely, 
> its been invisible.  I really like dnsmasq -- an integrated DNS / DHCP 
> server for small networks.
> 
> So tomorrow, I'm going to get another router.  Not sure what kind, any 
> suggestions?  Probably go to a retailer for it, and I'm happy to hear 
> suggestions on that too.
> 
> I'd like to use the new router as the 'main' one, and set up the old one 
> maybe not too far away as a supplemental signal, via WDS.
> 
> What firmware would you go with? 

OpenWRT if you want another box to administer.  With great power comes 
great responsibility.  DD-WRT if you just want it to work and never pay 
attention to it.

I've been using DD-WRT for a few years with absolutely great success. 
It's got basically everything I needed, so the lack of package 
management didn't make much difference.  My basic setup is 2 WRTs 
running in WDS to provide wifi throughout the house and wired access to 
the mythtv box in the living room.  I use dnsmasq and have no real 
problems with network services, other than not being able to assign the 
same IP address to my wired and wireless interfaces.  The IPv6 and VPN 
support are quite nice also.

Incidentally, I've had two WRT54Gs die on my over the course of the last 
few years.  My oldest one died last August after nearly four years of 
service.  It just stopped powering on anymore.  Taking it apart showed 
that there was power being supplied to the chips, but there were a few 
components that just didn't work.  I ripped the MiniPCI card out and put 
it my wife's X31 and it works just fine to give her 802.11g support in 
windows.

--Patrick