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OpenWrt One – Open Hardware Router

openwrt.org

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Re: OpenWrt One – Open Hardware Router

#31

Post by magicalhippo »

aborsy wrote: post #22

How about OPNSense on open hardware of your choice, and passing messy wireless to separate AP? OpenWRT is very good, but the installation and upgrades are not easy. There is a zoo of images for different hardware, installation options and tools. It has to run on small devices, so there are limitations. The documentation on Wiki is scattered and could be improved. I had to search forums for weeks for a custom package…

I agree on the upgrade story, though supposedly the recent move to apk will help in that regard.

I moved from pfSense to OpenWRT due to the really poor IPv6 support in pfSense. I don't use the AP capability either. How are things in OPNSense these days?

Particular pain points from pfSense was that it published global IP as DNS address to LAN clients and no way around it, so connectivity broke every time prefix changed, and no real support for specifying prefix-less firewall rules or similar, so couldn't really expose anything via IPv6 without pain.

Re: OpenWrt One – Open Hardware Router

#32

Post by philamonster »

baggachipz wrote: post #13

Off topic, but what amuses me about the "Wrt" name is that it was originally alternate firmware for the Linksys WRT54G router from 25 years ago. The name has stuck for whatever reason; I guess since only geeks use it and know what it is.

Recycled 4 or so WRT54G variants a couple years ago I ran Tomato on for friend's small businesses and my home in early 2000's.

Re: OpenWrt One – Open Hardware Router

#33

Post by aidenn0 »

PcChip wrote: post #24
aidenn0 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A 5 port 2.5GbE switch would upgrade this to 5 total ports (4x 2.5GbE), and costs less than $100. If you only need 1GbE then it's even cheaper. Outside of home-labs, it's rare for me to see any devices connected to the LAN side of a wireless router these days, and more than 1 (i.e. the non-portable device that is closest to the router) is exceedingly rare.

>Outside of home-labs, it's rare for me to see any devices connected to the LAN side of a wireless router these days I would assume every gaming desktop computer would be? I actually assumed every desktop would be...

Neither my parents nor my wife's parents have their desktop connected to their router. The cable modem isn't even in the same room as the desktop.

[edit]

If it matters, my mom no longer has a desktop (she uses a docked laptop now), but it is true of the docking station and was true of her previous desktop.

Re: OpenWrt One – Open Hardware Router

#34

Post by drdexebtjl »

naturalmovement wrote: post #4

[flagged]

There are no cheap commodity routers that can run OpenWrt, have modern Wi-Fi features, and are reasonably available (in the sense that you could buy one if your router fails).

OpenWrt is vastly superior to the proprietary software in commodity routers. Proprietary software gates software features behind more expensive models, even though the cheap hardware can handle them.

You also get software updates. Your hardware doesn't become a paperweight when the manufacturer refuses to fix a known, actively exploited vulnerability.

You'll get new features, for free.

> You're not attaching this monstrosity to the ceiling. I would hide it, but whatever.

The enclosure is open source as well. You can build/print your own enclosure if you'd prefer, or get any enclosure for the Banana Pi BPI-R4.

They can't just ship a board without an enclosure, because it won't pass certifications.

Re: OpenWrt One – Open Hardware Router

#35

Post by frugalmail »

aborsy wrote: post #22

How about OPNSense on open hardware of your choice, and passing messy wireless to separate AP? OpenWRT is very good, but the installation and upgrades are not easy. There is a zoo of images for different hardware, installation options and tools. It has to run on small devices, so there are limitations. The documentation on Wiki is scattered and could be improved. I had to search forums for weeks for a custom package…

You're right, it's interesting that this device isn't the most technically superior in hardware or software, and isn't the most casual user friendly. It seems to be targeting a segment I can't bucket other than loyalists. Maybe good hardware & software for the cost?

Re: OpenWrt One – Open Hardware Router

#36

Post by topspin »

naturalmovement wrote: post #4

[flagged]

> This thing has no practical purpose.

This is wrong. OpenWRT is fostering several manufacturers that are using OpenWRT as the factory platform for their products. This is a reference design (one of several, this particular one from 2024 is now dated and newer designs are available,) provided by OpenWRT, and they've thoughtfully made it available to anyone that might want one: you can just go buy some with no NDA bullshit and get your developers moving in your lab or doing UI development or whatever. The not-cost-optimized PCB is what you want for this, in addition to the ample RAM+Flash. The "useless" POE is another aspect of this: access points use POE ubiquitously, which is a key OpenWRT use case.

Re: OpenWrt One – Open Hardware Router

#37

Post by letmetweakit »

aborsy wrote: post #22

How about OPNSense on open hardware of your choice, and passing messy wireless to separate AP? OpenWRT is very good, but the installation and upgrades are not easy. There is a zoo of images for different hardware, installation options and tools. It has to run on small devices, so there are limitations. The documentation on Wiki is scattered and could be improved. I had to search forums for weeks for a custom package…

Upgrades are “owut upgrade” these days. Pretty straightforward.

Re: OpenWrt One – Open Hardware Router

#38

Post by mistercheph »

naturalmovement wrote: post #12
kennywinker wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Open hardware is nice. I love that you can take a commodity router and claw back some control, but why not start with that control in the first place?

But you can already do that with existing hardware that is 4x capable at the same price point, and runs OpenWRT. A reference platform makes no sense for OpenWRT as by its nature it runs on dozens upon dozens of different hardware, all which are different and must be tested independently.

It will take time to build up to a point where it's competitive on paper, it's insane that you're comparing a first-gen product from a rag-tag crew to the hardware produced by behemoths that have thousands of engineers and billions of dollars to play with.

Where my use cases don't permit it I won't use this, but if it fits I would rather buy an open-hardware device at ~10x the price of an equivalent proprietary device not out of charity but because that is how much more value it provides to me at equivalent hardware performance.

Re: OpenWrt One – Open Hardware Router

#39

Post by nicce »

naturalmovement wrote: post #29
nicce wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, POE with helps that. You don't need to plug in the power cable. Commenting "This reeks of LLM-generated content." is not helpful in general.

A desktop computer does not source PoE power. Do you even understand what PoE is or how it works? It's a false statement and a pattern commonly found in LLM slop answers.

> A desktop computer does not source POE power.

Well, mine does. Look for PCIe, PoE+/PSE cards.

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