introduction tp link mr3020 openwrt

hello guys... this is my second blog... i will introduce you with the item i brought yesterday. It was an portable wireless mini router access point type tp-link TL-MR3020. this thing can connect multiple device like smartphone, android, blackberry, ipod, ipad, tablets, laptop and all other thing which have Wi-Fi enabled device (etc: a pc with usb wireless plug in it) and share the internet connection. And if you havent know  tp-link TL-MR3020 does support wireless n router mode.

There are 3 main mode that can we used in this device.

• 3g router mode
• WISP client router mode
• Access point mode

As for 3g router mode its mainly used for sharing mobile internet connection to area on your place (shared via Wi-Fi).we need a 3g usb modem with any kind of operator that support internet connection like WCDMA /  HSDPA to make this work.  It  can be used with any gsm / cdma operator.  

for WISP client router mode, the devices is being used for catch and forwarding internet connection from another access point connection. Also it can be used for dialling pppoe connection then shared it via wifi.

and last the access point mode. its used for bridge an ethernet cable and wi fi connection so it become connected. (we can share internet connection from cable to wifi so everyone in the area can connected via wifi).

the size is also very small that we can carry it anyhere on our pocket.



as for myself, why i buy this router...? its because i want to tweak this access point portable and changed its firmware to openwrt / linux. for a 30$ access point can compete with devices like mikrotik/cisco wireless 70$++ because its sooooooo~~ many  feature when the firmware changed into openwrt


the tweak possibilities is unlimited because it depends on the developper of the linux firmware itself . as it can be act as an

• firewall
• qos limit streaming downloading so we can keep the latency to play games online
• port forwarding  (if we want to make a server in our private lan so it can be accessed from outside )
• real time monitoring bandwidth, input output, throughput lan
• act as a vpn client / server
• active torrent client (we can use our usb or  external hardisk to save the files )
• remote torrent (torrent box / seedbox)
• traffic shapping
• load balance between two or more usb modem / wifi / wired isp network  
• voip server (voice over internet) 
• file sharing
• usb via ip
• printer sharing via wifi
• webcam streaming via wifi
• web server + php and ajax and captive portal  (making hotspot authentication)
• cloud computing server with owncloud
• ssh access / tunneling protocol
• ftp server
• dhcp server

and other many feature that you can read the rest at  http://wiki.openwrt.org/doc/start.

and i recomend to see this link http://wiki.daviddarts.com/PirateBox

really great isnt it... and all of that feature can be installed on one devices. that works with a 5 VDC/ 1.0 A adapter :) :)  :)


1 word from me, awesome.....  :)

you can first read my post on  http://tplinkmr3020.blogspot.com/2012/08/basic1-choosing-openwrt-version.html to start flashing and changing the firmware to openwrt....


happy tweaking guys ;)

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basic1 choosing openwrt version

 there are two kind  of  openwrt version :   the latest stable (Backfire) or the latest nightly build (Attitude Adjustment) .


these two provides different kind of condition. while in nightly build all the newest functionality will work, but sometimes have bug. because it was being tested and the bug havent been solved yet.  its good to test all your script in nightly build. basicly on other tp link like mr-3420 and mr-3220 already support the backfire version. But for the mr-3020 we can only use that attitude adjustment. at least for now....


currently it shown on http://wiki.openwrt.org/toh/tp-link/tl-mr3020?s[]=mr3020 that we can see that our device already supported. mine hardware version was version 1.6.


oyeah, before that

if you click that link you will be download the

http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/trunk/ar71xx/openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-mr3020-v1-jffs2-factory.bin


see this first before proceed....

http://forum.openwrt.org/viewtopic.php?id=33429&p=6    on post #134

if we install the above version looks like it doesnt provide us with failsafe recover. that means if you brick your access point router because miss configuration, you must open the case and hard reset  manually by connecting into a cable.


so i advice using this under link to flash the firmware. As i already tested, and can failsafe recovery (reset the configuration to the default) later.

nb** :  Be careful to choose firmware version. Its recommended to read all the wiki and the forum first.


http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/trunk/ar71xx/openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-mr3020-v1-squashfs-factory.bin




to flash the firmware go to your access point setting menu via browser (default is 192.168.0.254)
system tools > firmware upgrade > then choose the file that we already downloaded. i forgot to screenshot when i flash the firmware to openwrt but the step as just like the picture below.... (with different file ofcourse :D :D :D )

at first it doesnt provide any web interface and the default ip will change to 192.168.1.1 thats why sometimes people say "why i cant access my mr3020 box" or  " why i cant access the mr3020 after flashing openwrt firmware". because we need to set ip of our pc to range 192.168.1.2-254 to access the mr3020 ip which was 192.168.1.1 after being flashed to open wrt.


**nb:  our openwrt  doesnt support web interface yet... because it doesnt have enough memory to save and running it. but there is a way to "hack" the ap so that it can install the web interface (we called this luci) on other storage like usb / hardisk


after we change the ip. open start > command promt > telnet 192.168.1.1.


by doing this we get ATTITUDE ADJUSTMENT (Bleeding Edge, r33181) version :) :) :)

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