7 ms·

I still don't get why no commercial hardware vendor offers products specifically designed for this software. OSS router software for home seems to be far superi

I still don't get why no commercial hardware vendor offers products specifically designed for this software. OSS router software for home seems to be far superior then all the proprietary stuff that's out there.

dimensi0nal 9y ago
Someone who would buy hardware like that would probably choose a wired router with pfSense and separate access points instead.
- toast0 9y ago
  'wireless routers' usually work fine as an access point + Ethernet switch when you disable dhcpd and don't use the wan port (nice ones let you use the wan port as another lan port). They're usually cheaper than a dedicated access point too.
  - alimbada 9y ago
    What's the advantage of disabling dhcpd?
    - kabes 9y ago
      Well, he's talking about access points. You don't want multiple DHCP servers in your network.
    - BuildTheRobots 9y ago
      I think OPs point is that he's already got a router running DHCP on the network, but if you disable all the router-like services on a second device you can use it as a dedicated access point.
dboreham 9y ago
Some reasons: If it has wireless then you enter a minefield of regulatory and approvals pain. I suspect that under the current fcc rules you can't sell hardware that isn't locked to its firmware (because if you did users would be able to freeband). There already exist some products that pretty much meet the requirement so the niche for pure play OSS is even smaller than you might imagine. e.g. Mikrotik sells a huge line of products running Linux under the hood. If you are familiar with kernel networking you can easily work with their CLI and UI. Very low cost. Does everything Linux does and is fcc approved. One you get beyond super-low cost (e.g. into 10G NICs and wire-speed 1G routing) customers expect stuff to work, and with an OSS kernel plonked onto someone else's hardware it probably won't 100% work. This again constrains the niche within which pure OSS is viable.
- burnte 9y ago
  > I suspect that under the current fcc rules you can't sell hardware that isn't locked to its firmware (because if you did users would be able to freeband). You absolutely can and most companies do not lock their firmware. There are companies that commercially sell routers with DD-WRT and other OSS firmwares by default, like Buffalo. http://www.buffalotech.com/news/dd-wrt-nxt-routers http://www.buffalotech.com/news/dd-wrt-nxt-routers End users are expected to adhere to FCC rules even if they have the technical ability to violate them.
  - gsich 9y ago
    What is "freeband"? Most chips have hardware limitations, so it does not matter what firmware you install. For most chips it is unrealistic that they can eg. use 1 W as output power.
  - boomboomsubban 9y ago
    >End users are expected to adhere to FCC rules even if they have the technical ability to violate them. The FCC rules changed ~two years ago, you aren't allowed to sell devices capable of violating FCC rules. The original rule just banned third party firmware, but after some outrage it was changed so that the easiest way to comply was blocking third party firmware. They clearly wanted to ban them altogether, wouldn't be surprised if they were working on it right now
    - burnte 9y ago
      I disagree they wanted to ban firmware, they simply want to prevent interference. I doubt they actually CARE about the firmware. Regardless, nothing you mentioned changes what I said. Yes, under the revised rules [1] manufacturers are required to ensure certain changes can't be made, such as disabling DFS and using non-standard channels. And as I said, the FCC explicitly does not ban third party firmware. The biggest reason is that it's cheaper to make adjustments to the radio chips to prevent certain changes than it is to swear to the FCC no one can hack in new firmware. And as I stated and you quoted, users are still required to follow FCC rules. You can't hook up an external signal amp to boost transmit power past legal levels, use unapproved channels, etc, even if they find bypasses for the protections required by the FCC. You can't use a signal booster for a TV antenna that causes interference. You can't boost power on your CB radio. Etc. [1] https://apps.fcc.gov/kdb/GetAttachment.html?id=zXtrctoj6zH7oNEOO6De6g%3D%3D&desc=594280%20D02%20U-NII%20Device%20Security%20v01r03&tracking_number=39498 https://apps.fcc.gov/kdb/GetAttachment.html?id=zXtrctoj6zH7o...
freestockoption 9y ago
Could it be that most hardware vendors feel that their value-add is in software? Or they feel offering something like OpenWRT would cannibalize sales of their higher end offerings like VPN routers? I will not buy a router if I can't flash OpenWRT on it. It's a requirement for me now.
snowball2 9y ago
The https://www.gl-inet.com/ https://www.gl-inet.com/ routers are awesome and ship with OpenWRT, with their custom web interface on top, you can also flash them with the latest OpenWRT and depending on the model they support vlans and some have micro sd card readers built in, fantastic fun :-)
wtallis 9y ago
The companies that sell routers are not the companies that design the chips and write the drivers. Even when eg. Linksys wants to make an open-source friendly router, they often have to choose between using the latest chips that don't have mature upstream drivers, or using the older chips that have solid support. They don't have the ability to create good open-source code on their own. But most of the time, they end up going with the cheaper Broadcom chipsets, or switching to them in a later product revision. (Broadcom's WiFi driver situation is about as Linux-unfriendly as NVidia's graphics drivers.)
moondev 9y ago
I bought this mini router recently that comes with OpenWRT pre-installed. It's an awesome little device! http://www.gl-inet.com/mt300n-v2/ http://www.gl-inet.com/mt300n-v2/
- IgorPartola 9y ago
  Whoa. That looks great! Is it stock OpenWRT? Does it auto-update? Do you get root on it?
  - gsich 9y ago
    No gigabit port.
    - jrrrr 9y ago
      You must have a really fast internet connection.
      - snaky 9y ago
        There are many places (outside US) where you can get 200MBit for $10 or so.
        fyfy18 9y ago
        1 gigabit symmetric for €20/mo here in Lithuania. Assuming you like cold winters :-) Back on topic, what hardware are people with these sort of speeds running? It seems most consumer routers usually top out around 500mbit for NATing. I’m currnetly using a Mikrotik Hex with RouterOS, but prefer OpenWRT/LEDE.
      - gsich 9y ago
        Slightly more then 100 Mbit/s Downlink. But this also makes the 300 Mbit/s for Wlan useless. So maybe for some small stuff it is usable. But then again, it is not very cheap either.
    - 9y ago
xav0989 9y ago
ASUS has ASUSWRT, but it's based on tomato, not openwrt.
mcbridematt 9y ago
OpenWRT has been the base for some chip and router vendor SDKs for a while now - Qualcomm/Atheros SoCs and Technicolor gateways for example. So your ISP router may already be running OpenWRT underneath. However, most home level routers usually rely on (proprietary) hardware traffic offload which is why the code doesn't float back upstream.
__david__ 9y ago
Maybe not quite specifically designed, but http://pcengines.ch http://pcengines.ch has great little boards that I've been running OpenWRT on for years and years. I'd never buy a consumer router again.
Integer 9y ago
The Turris Omnia [1] is an open-source router which uses a fork of OpenWRT as it's OS, and has auto-update. Kinda pricey, but the hardware is good. [1] https://omnia.turris.cz/en/ https://omnia.turris.cz/en/
kabes 9y ago
They do. The Linksys WRT range is branded to be easy to put OpenWRT/DD-WRT on: https://www.linksys.com/us/wrt-performance-perfected https://www.linksys.com/us/wrt-performance-perfected

dimensi0nal 9y ago

Someone who would buy hardware like that would probably choose a wired router with pfSense and separate access points instead.

toast0 9y ago
'wireless routers' usually work fine as an access point + Ethernet switch when you disable dhcpd and don't use the wan port (nice ones let you use the wan port as another lan port). They're usually cheaper than a dedicated access point too.
- alimbada 9y ago
  What's the advantage of disabling dhcpd?
  - kabes 9y ago
    Well, he's talking about access points. You don't want multiple DHCP servers in your network.
  - BuildTheRobots 9y ago
    I think OPs point is that he's already got a router running DHCP on the network, but if you disable all the router-like services on a second device you can use it as a dedicated access point.

dboreham 9y ago

Some reasons: If it has wireless then you enter a minefield of regulatory and approvals pain. I suspect that under the current fcc rules you can't sell hardware that isn't locked to its firmware (because if you did users would be able to freeband). There already exist some products that pretty much meet the requirement so the niche for pure play OSS is even smaller than you might imagine. e.g. Mikrotik sells a huge line of products running Linux under the hood. If you are familiar with kernel networking you can easily work with their CLI and UI. Very low cost. Does everything Linux does and is fcc approved. One you get beyond super-low cost (e.g. into 10G NICs and wire-speed 1G routing) customers expect stuff to work, and with an OSS kernel plonked onto someone else's hardware it probably won't 100% work. This again constrains the niche within which pure OSS is viable.

burnte 9y ago
> I suspect that under the current fcc rules you can't sell hardware that isn't locked to its firmware (because if you did users would be able to freeband). You absolutely can and most companies do not lock their firmware. There are companies that commercially sell routers with DD-WRT and other OSS firmwares by default, like Buffalo. http://www.buffalotech.com/news/dd-wrt-nxt-routers http://www.buffalotech.com/news/dd-wrt-nxt-routers End users are expected to adhere to FCC rules even if they have the technical ability to violate them.
- gsich 9y ago
  What is "freeband"? Most chips have hardware limitations, so it does not matter what firmware you install. For most chips it is unrealistic that they can eg. use 1 W as output power.
- boomboomsubban 9y ago
  >End users are expected to adhere to FCC rules even if they have the technical ability to violate them. The FCC rules changed ~two years ago, you aren't allowed to sell devices capable of violating FCC rules. The original rule just banned third party firmware, but after some outrage it was changed so that the easiest way to comply was blocking third party firmware. They clearly wanted to ban them altogether, wouldn't be surprised if they were working on it right now
  - burnte 9y ago
    I disagree they wanted to ban firmware, they simply want to prevent interference. I doubt they actually CARE about the firmware. Regardless, nothing you mentioned changes what I said. Yes, under the revised rules [1] manufacturers are required to ensure certain changes can't be made, such as disabling DFS and using non-standard channels. And as I said, the FCC explicitly does not ban third party firmware. The biggest reason is that it's cheaper to make adjustments to the radio chips to prevent certain changes than it is to swear to the FCC no one can hack in new firmware. And as I stated and you quoted, users are still required to follow FCC rules. You can't hook up an external signal amp to boost transmit power past legal levels, use unapproved channels, etc, even if they find bypasses for the protections required by the FCC. You can't use a signal booster for a TV antenna that causes interference. You can't boost power on your CB radio. Etc. [1] https://apps.fcc.gov/kdb/GetAttachment.html?id=zXtrctoj6zH7oNEOO6De6g%3D%3D&desc=594280%20D02%20U-NII%20Device%20Security%20v01r03&tracking_number=39498 https://apps.fcc.gov/kdb/GetAttachment.html?id=zXtrctoj6zH7o...

freestockoption 9y ago

Could it be that most hardware vendors feel that their value-add is in software? Or they feel offering something like OpenWRT would cannibalize sales of their higher end offerings like VPN routers? I will not buy a router if I can't flash OpenWRT on it. It's a requirement for me now.

snowball2 9y ago

The https://www.gl-inet.com/ https://www.gl-inet.com/ routers are awesome and ship with OpenWRT, with their custom web interface on top, you can also flash them with the latest OpenWRT and depending on the model they support vlans and some have micro sd card readers built in, fantastic fun :-)

wtallis 9y ago

The companies that sell routers are not the companies that design the chips and write the drivers. Even when eg. Linksys wants to make an open-source friendly router, they often have to choose between using the latest chips that don't have mature upstream drivers, or using the older chips that have solid support. They don't have the ability to create good open-source code on their own. But most of the time, they end up going with the cheaper Broadcom chipsets, or switching to them in a later product revision. (Broadcom's WiFi driver situation is about as Linux-unfriendly as NVidia's graphics drivers.)

moondev 9y ago

I bought this mini router recently that comes with OpenWRT pre-installed. It's an awesome little device! http://www.gl-inet.com/mt300n-v2/ http://www.gl-inet.com/mt300n-v2/

IgorPartola 9y ago
Whoa. That looks great! Is it stock OpenWRT? Does it auto-update? Do you get root on it?
- gsich 9y ago
  No gigabit port.
  - jrrrr 9y ago
    You must have a really fast internet connection.
    - snaky 9y ago
      There are many places (outside US) where you can get 200MBit for $10 or so.
      - fyfy18 9y ago
        1 gigabit symmetric for €20/mo here in Lithuania. Assuming you like cold winters :-) Back on topic, what hardware are people with these sort of speeds running? It seems most consumer routers usually top out around 500mbit for NATing. I’m currnetly using a Mikrotik Hex with RouterOS, but prefer OpenWRT/LEDE.
    - gsich 9y ago
      Slightly more then 100 Mbit/s Downlink. But this also makes the 300 Mbit/s for Wlan useless. So maybe for some small stuff it is usable. But then again, it is not very cheap either.
  - 9y ago

xav0989 9y ago

ASUS has ASUSWRT, but it's based on tomato, not openwrt.

mcbridematt 9y ago

OpenWRT has been the base for some chip and router vendor SDKs for a while now - Qualcomm/Atheros SoCs and Technicolor gateways for example. So your ISP router may already be running OpenWRT underneath. However, most home level routers usually rely on (proprietary) hardware traffic offload which is why the code doesn't float back upstream.

__david__ 9y ago

Maybe not quite specifically designed, but http://pcengines.ch http://pcengines.ch has great little boards that I've been running OpenWRT on for years and years. I'd never buy a consumer router again.

Integer 9y ago

The Turris Omnia [1] is an open-source router which uses a fork of OpenWRT as it's OS, and has auto-update. Kinda pricey, but the hardware is good. [1] https://omnia.turris.cz/en/ https://omnia.turris.cz/en/

kabes 9y ago

They do. The Linksys WRT range is branded to be easy to put OpenWRT/DD-WRT on: https://www.linksys.com/us/wrt-performance-perfected https://www.linksys.com/us/wrt-performance-perfected