Routers Linksys E3000 Bricked - Unable to Find Firmware to Reflash

skinz

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I managed to brick my linksys e3000 router last night somehow, I really dont know how - it just stopped working with the power light flashing blue. Appraently this means the router firmware is corrupt.

Now when I go to linksys website there is no firmware to download. Speaking to an online agent I am told this firmware is no longer available "Due to the GPL (General Purpose License) rules that govern the use of this firmware, we are no longer able to provide this firmware for download".

I mean seriously so what do you do. Where can I find this firmware or is there any other I can directly flash to it (I read somewhere that I am unable to directly flash DD-WRT)
 
Thanks Shaun, Ill give this a go
 
So I have managed to connect via usb to serial using one of these as I was not able to ping the router by Ethernet cable using this site How to fix a Bricked Linksys Router

USB To TTL / COM Converter Module buildin-in CP2102 - UK SELLER | eBay

So I followed these 2 guides

https://blog.ttrsite.net/2011/12/serial-connection-to-cisco-e3000/

Unbrick hard bricked (no ping) Linksys E3000 via serial connection. | lukemacneil.com

Using Hyper Terminal I can see the mac address and that the serial connection has allocated an ip of 192.168.1.1 and subnet 255.255.255.0 but when I go to the next step and connect an Ethernet wire from the router to my pc (which I have configured on the same subnet with ip of 192.168.1.2) I cannot ping the router however every so often I am able to connect with varying degrees of success sometime it will ping perfect 100% then subsequent tries it will lose 25%, 50%, 100% of packets.

I am beginning to think I may have blown the Ethernet ports on the router as I get the same if I try any of the ports on the back of the router, is it possible to partially blow the ports

I believe it is to do with the ports as I was not able to connect via Ethernet Cable when using the lancelhoff guide in the first link
 
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here are some screen shoots if anyone has any ideas - I still am losing packets or should I just chuck it


Command Line 1.pngCommand Line 2.pngConnected.pngHyper Terminal Settings.pngUSB - Serial Connected.pngPC Static IP.pngHyperTerminalConnected.png
 
No one has any ideas ????
 
The image checksum is correct, it looks like the firmware is as it should be.

Possibly corrupt NVRAM?

Code:
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Thanks Spectre, Ill give this another go but I am just wondering why I am unable to ping the router by ethernet cable or shall i say after pinging the first time it will not ping again. I thought that once I had connected the ethernet I should be able to keep pinging with no drop out every time time I try.

Also the last time I tried I noticed that once I press CTRL +C to enter CFE, sometime my keystrokes are showing on screen, like the CFE screen has frozen
 
It's probably the CPU going away and trying to do something else or it's not configuring the switch (maybe a separate IC in the router) properly. It is bringing up an exception so that might be stopping the CPU at different times so you'll get different behaviour from it. From that site it looks like you might need a JTAG interface to fix it.
 
It's probably the CPU going away and trying to do something else or it's not configuring the switch (maybe a separate IC in the router) properly. It is bringing up an exception so that might be stopping the CPU at different times so you'll get different behaviour from it. From that site it looks like you might need a JTAG interface to fix it.

Ummm JTAG, heard allot about this method but never tried it :FRIGHT:. Going to have a look now

Thanks again
 
So I gave this another go last night, seems like I have defo fooked this one up as I cannot use CTRL + C to see the CFE> prompt using the serial connection. The screen just hangs and you cannot type anything. On the plus side I did figure out a couple of things which someone else may find useful.

jtag is a challenge on the e3000 because linksys has disabled the circuit. So looks like I will be binning this, anyways

When connected to HyperTerminal and you break the boot sequence by using CTRL+C you should see the ip address and subnet (in my case 192.168.1.1 & 255.255.255.0) However as the following link suggests, this may be wrong and it was in my case. The ip I was able to ping was 192.168.1.114, I still don’t understand why then I was able to ping 192.168.1.1 a couple of times before getting destination host unreachable. Maybe its IP is 192.168.1.1 while its booting and after a certain time the ip changes to 192.168.1.114

so the following may be useful.

DD-WRT Forum :: View topic - Peacock Thread-FAQ: EVERYTHING you NEED to know! Really!!

6. Is your router bricked? A bricked router is a router that you can no longer communicate with through wireless or wired connections. It will give no response. Just because a router doesn't seem to be fully working, doesn't mean it is bricked. Most of the time when we refer to a bricked router, we mean that it is not responding to a wired connection and needs a jtag or serial cable to fix it.

A brick will normally not respond to pings at all. Often, all the lan lights and the power light are lit when a router is bricked, even those with no cable in the lan port. If you can get your router to respond to pings, there is hope.

When pinging the router:

If reply has TTL of 100, the bootloader (CFE) is responding. This is the best time to start the TFTP transfer. In most cases you should be able to flash dd-wrt firmware if you are getting any ttl=100 responses, as long as you flash at the start of these ping responses. See note 11 about how to flash. Timing can be tricky.

If reply has TTL of 64, the operating system firmware(i.e. Linux, dd-wrt) is responding. The good news here is that there IS operating system firmware on your router.

Routers with boot wait enabled will give you a few ping responses of ttl=100, while the operating system is loading, prior to changing to ttl=64. This enables you to flash firmware at bootup with tftp if you wish to.

If there is no operating system firmware (dd-wrt) on the router (flash of firmware did not take for some reason), you will only get ttl=100 from the bootloader.

If you get "destination host unreachable", you likely have your computer on a different sub-network than the one you are trying to ping. Check to make sure that you have your computer set to the same static IP subnet (eg.192.168.1.10) as the address you are trying to ping.

If you only get "request timeout" responses, and you are pinging properly to the correct IP of the router from the same subnet,this is not good (router might be bricked) but we can still try TFTP just in case. Here's what to do:

Try to ping at ALL the ip addresses that your router has ever had. Make sure that you set the IP on your computer to the same first three octets of the IP you are trying to ping. Usually, you will set the IP of the computer to 192.168.1.8. Then, at your command prompt, ping -t 192.168.1.1. Watch and report the results, if you have a problem.

Be SURE to check your power supply and make sure it is the correct one for your router. We often see that people have used the wrong power supply and then find their router doesn't work. Also, power supplies fail, and if the capacitors are weak the power supply might seem fine when the router is not under load but often the supply won't work right at reboot, right when you need it to function properly. If you have another power supply, try both.

Specifically, here are the steps to see whether you have a brick and need to jtag (or use a serial cable):

a. Make sure your computer hardware, especially your lan cable are working properly. Make sure your network adapter is working. Check your router power supply.
b. Disable all virus protection and firewalls on the computer. Also, disable any wireless cards.
c. Connect one computer to the router with a cable. Have no other connections to the router except one computer and one cable to that computer.
d. Set your computer ip address to 192.168.1.10 (if that is the same subnet as the router is supposed to be at).
e. Try to ping the router using the command "ping -t 192.168.1.1" (presuming that 192.168.1.1 is the address your router was set to.) See if there are ANY responses. (There WILL be A response...you are looking for a ttl= response)
f. If there are no ttl= responses, do a hard reset on your router. Make sure you get this right. (See note 1.) This should set your router back to dd-wrt defaults. Check to see what the dd-wrt default is for your router. Usually this is 192.168.1.1. Some routers are 192.168.10.1 and some are 192.168.1.245. You then need to redo steps d. and e. using the new ip address. Make sure if the subnet has changed, your have changed your computer to match the subnet.
g. Start continuous pings to your router again. Note the responses. If they are not ttl=64, you have a problem. While the pings are continuing, power cycle your router. (This means unplug it, count to 30, and plug it back in). Watch the lights and wait until they come back on or for any changes. This could take a minute. Carefully watch for any ttl= responses during this time.
h. If you do get ttl=64 that is the firmware responding. Your router is likely not bricked. Look elsewhere for your problem.
i. If there are no ttl= responses, do a hard reset on your router, while the pings continue. Again. watch for any ping responses. If you get none, you likely need to jtag or use one of the recovery methods listed below in this note. Your router is bricked.

If you get a few ping responses of ttl=100, or even 1, that is the CFE saying "Send me a firmware! NOW!" But you have to hit it with a tftp right then, when the ping responses start. See note 11 (below) and repeat the procedure that got your a ttl=100 response then try to get the tftp timing right.
Some routers can be bricked even if they do give some ttl=100 responses to pings, but this is less common. Some routers can be bricked if the lights are not all lit, but again, this is not common. However, if the lights are all lit, and you cannot get a ping response, the router is definitely bricked. You can try the alternate recovery methods below, but if none work and you can't tftp, you must use serial recovery or jtag to fix it. (See the Links to the Wiki articles on these, below). It is often a wise idea to tftp oem firmware back onto the router if you get a ttl=100 response, but you will not be able to do so if you had to change the bootloader to install dd-wrt (linksys wrt54g v5 -8 for example. If you are not sure if you can flash oem firmware, ask in the forum!)
 
Next, following on from pinging the router to the next step - instead of using cmd prompt to move the file to the router, use hyperterminal in conjunction with tftp and follow the instructions in

Unbrick hard bricked (no ping) Linksys E3000 via serial connection. | lukemacneil.com

But where it shows the following statement in the above link, you can use the tftp program listed below with instructions and continue following lukemacneils tutorial
Using another terminal (or command prompt) prepare the TFTP command to put the firmware on the device.
In linux, I connected to tftp 192.168.1.1, then set the mode to binary, set the timeout to 90 seconds, and entered:

1 CFE> put <filename>


Use this tftp utility

http://www.dd-wrt.com/dd-wrtv2/downloads/others/tornado/Windows-TFTP/tftp2.exe

Set your computer to a static IP 192.168.1.9 (presuming your router has a default IP address of 192.168.1.1...if it is 192.168.11.1, like some Buffalo routers, set your computer to 192.168.11.9.etc) and 255.255.255.0 for a mask.

Plug ethernet cable into lan port

Configure your tftp utility (tftp.exe or tftp2.exe)

IP=192.168.1.1 (or your router's default IP address)
no password - leave blank
select the firmware
set retries to 99

unplug power adapter from router, plug back in...hit upgrade button immediately.

wait a full 3-5 minutes after you get success message (you should be able to access the webgui), then do a power cycle, and wait for the webgui to come up, do a proper HARD reset, and wait for the webgui again...configure.

Timing is everything with tftp.exe. When your router is in trouble, you often have to hit the upgrade at exactly the right time for it to fully upload. You can get some guidance from this thread which explains how to put a router into management mode:
DD-WRT Forum :: View topic - Finally "bricked" my WRT310n, looking for some gui

HTH’s someone :)

I have attached the driver for the usb to ttl serial connection mentioned earlier in the thread, hyperterminal and tftp2, Excuse me while I go and chuck the router in the bin
 

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