I recently ordered one of the newer Asus routers just to stay up on the wifi world and I decided on the RT-N16. I normally like open-wrt firmware however its still listed as a work in progress for this router. This left me with 2 options, Tomato firmware and DD-WRT firmware. For the first run I decided on DD-WRT. Below I will outline the relatively simply steps to get up and running with dd-wrt on the n16
The specs on the router are really nice:
The WAN and LAN ports are RJ-45 for 10/100/1000 Base T
There are 3 x external detachable antennas
There are 2 USB2.0 ports
WiFi Operating Frequency = 2.4GHz ~ 2.5GHz
RAM = 128 MB
Flash = 32 MB
Loading the new firmware has gotten pretty painless. Most of the newer routers are coming with a upgrade tool which is available through the stock web GUI.
You will need the following 2 files
1. Press the WPS button on the router and let it complete a full reset. NOTE: This will wipe all your settings and/or any data.
2. Once the router is rebooted disconnect your computer from the internet and plug a ethernet cable form your computer into on of the LAN ports
3. Open up Internet Explorer and navigate to http://192.168.1.1 NOTE: Please use Internet Explorer, other web browsers may have unpredictable behavior.
4. Login with the default username: admin and the default password: admin
5. Select the Advanced tab on the left hand side and then from there select the Administration tab.
6. On the Administration tab select firmware upgrade
7. Use the browse button to select the mini trx firmware we downloaded at the beginning of the article.
8. Press the upgrade button and do not do anything else. NOTE: If a firmware upgrade is interrupted it can reder your device “bricked”
9. Once the router reboots you should be presented with the DD-WRT login page.
10. You may need to set a new username and password at this point to be able to log on. For now just use admin & admin again
11. Once you are loged on the the web interface, do a Factory Reset to clear the NVRAM. This is located under Administration -> Factory Defaults. You will be presented with the password change screen again after this step is complete.
12. Once you are logged back into the web interface we now want to install the full version of the firmware.
13. Browse to Administration -> Firmware upgrade and use the browse button again to select the full bin version of DD-Wrt we downloaded at the beginning.
14. Press the upgrade button to flash the firmware. NOTE : in the Firmware Upgrade Tab where it says “After flashing, reset to” choose “Reset to Default settings”.
15. This flash may take up to 5-10 mins so grab some coffee and wait for the router to reboot it self.
16. Upon reboot you will be presented with the log on page with a chance to set a new password.
I have not yet tested all the features of this router but it looks to be a very powerful machine.
