HOWTO : DD-WRT on TP-Link TL-WR1043ND

TP-Link TL-WR1043ND comes with 1 Gigabit WAN and 4 Gigabit LAN as well as 1 USB port. The USB port is for storage purpose. It is a 300Mbps N Wireless router.



This router can flash to DD-WRT to enhance its features. One interested thing is that it can support 3.5G USB modem after flashing to DD-WRT. As far as I know, it supports Hauwei 3.5G modem only. After flashed to DD-WRT, your router can act as a VPN server. It also supports WDS.



Step 1 :



Download the DD-WRT for this router. Beware, other version of DD-WRT does not work on this router; otherwise, your router will be bricked.



The current version of DD-WRT at the time of this writing for this router is V24 preSPs2 r14144.



If you are the first time to flash the router (not upgrading), download the file "factory-to-ddwrt.bin". If you are upgrading the DD-WRT of this router, download the file "tl-wr1043nd-webflash.bin" instead. IF YOU WANT TO UPGRADE TO NEWER VERSION OF DD-WRT, THIS TUTORIAL IS USELESS!



Step 2 :



Connect the router and computer via the LAN port. Point your browser to http://192.168.1.1. Enter "admin" for username and password.



Step 3 :



Flash the DD-WRT firmware from the official webpage as usual. DO NOT UNPLUG THE CABLE AND SWITCH OFF THE COMPUTER AS WELL AS ROUTER WHEN FLASHING THE FIRMWARE.



Step 4 :



After the router is rebooted, telnet to the router :



telnet 192.168.1.1



Username is "root" and password is "admin".



Issue the command :



mtd -r erase nvram

reboot



After the router is rebooted, unplug the power cable of the router and wait for a while. Then plug in the power cable again. Now, your router is ready to use and it is DD-WRTed.



Step 5 :



Use your browser to point to http://192.168.1.1. Then change the username and password. Be careful, do not mis-type the username. However, you can change the username and password later.



Step 6 (Optional) :



Flash back to factory firmware.



Download the modified factory firmware at here. Extract and save it to a USB stick. Insert the USB stick to the USB port of the router.



Telnet to the router. Make sure the USB stick is connected and mounted.



mtd -e linux -r write /mnt/ linux



The screen will display :



root@ router_name:/tmp# mtd -e linux -r write /mnt/0x20200.bin linux

Unlocking linux ...

Erasing linux ...

Writing from /mnt/0x20200.bin to linux ... [w], which the [w] will change between [w] and [e]




After a few minutes, the following is shown :



Connection to host lost.



After these steps, the router will be flashed back to factory firmware.



** Beware, I did not try this Step 6 myself. Or, your router will be bricked. **



**IMPORTANT**



Make sure the SSH and Telnet are disabled on the flashed dd-wrt router; otherwise, you will be hacked.



That's all! See you.