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Bricked AC1200 - issue rebooting firmware via tftp on mac os
Like others, I got a notification on my phone that there's a new firmware for my router. I hit install, and it said it installed successfully, but then immediately after my wifi network disappeared a...
Got it to work via nmrpflash!
Steps for those on Mac OS, since it is completely not explained anywhere for noobs, here's what I did after lots of trial and error
1. Download the latest firmware from the Netgear website and extract it to your desktop.
2. Follow instructions here to set a static IP. FWIW, I left my Router entry blank as antinode suggested.
3. Use an ethernet cord to connect to the router (one of the LAN ports, not the internet port).
4. Download macOS file here: https://github.com/jclehner/nmrpflash/releases
5. Extract the zip file to your desktop as well
5. Open terminal, type
cd desktop
6. Then, I followed the instructions in the github page. These are the commands I used specifically:
./nmrpflash -L
to pull up the list of connections and find the name of my ethernet port connected to the router (Find the one with IP 192.168.1.10)
7. Then you turn OFF the router.
8. For the rest of this example, let's assume that your router is connected to eth2, and that you want to flash a firmware image named R6230_V1.1.0.104_1.0.1.img.
./nmrpflash -i eth2 -f R6230_V1.1.0.104_1.0.1.img
At this point I got an error saying I need to "run as root" so I simply added "sudo" to the beginning of the command.
sudo ./nmrpflash -i eth2 -f R6230_V1.1.0.104_1.0.1.img
Then I got the response
Waiting for physical connection
9. And then I turned on my router. I did have the reset button pushed in while turning it on. Once I turned it on, I noticed only the internet light was on. All others were off. I'd never had that happen in the past day when I was trying to fix this thing, so I knew something was going well.
After that, it should do its thing. You will see some messages in terminal but sometimes there will be a minute or two with no updates, just wait. It took about 5 minutes, I just had to wait. Once nmrpflash tells you to reboot your device, do so and it should work now.
10. Funny enough once I got the router back on and reconfigured it, it offered to install new firmware. I went ahead and did it via my app (which is what bricked it in the first place), figuring they had patched the bug. Looks like I was right. The new version is 106 and it restarted fine this time, but if it fails again then you can always use nmrpflash to reboot it.
Hope this helps those who are mac users. For windows users I imagine it might be a bit easier to run nmrpflash but I don't know.
antinode thanks for your reply
1. Regarding the ping - it would stop working when I unplugged the router, so I figured I had done it right. But I will try again with the other IP.
2. This is a super noob question but 192.168.1.1 and 192.168.1.10 are 2 different IPs, right? If yes, why do the instructions have me set almost the same IP for my manual connection as the router? That seems confusing!
3. For the timing and reset button - I have fiddled with all of that. If I turn it on with the reset button held, the wifi and internet LEDs start flashing one at a time like a train crossing. Neither that or the regular bootup mode seems to work. Same for the timing of the put command - I have tried it right as the ping starts going, or a while after. No difference.
4. However if the answer to #2 is the IPs are different, then should my tftp be connecting to 192.168.1.10 and not 192.168.1.1? Could that be the problem?
> 1. Regarding the ping - [...]
Which is still invisible...
> [...] 192.168.1.1 and 192.168.1.10 are 2 different IPs, right? If yes,
> why do the instructions have me set almost the same IP for my manual
> connection as the router? That seems confusing!
Don't your neighbors have similar but different street addresses?
"almost the same" means "different".
Instant IP[v4] network addressing:
Given a netmask of "255.255.255.0" ("/24"), which is about all you'll
ever see in this context...
In an address like "a.b.c.d", the "a.b.c" ("network") part is common
to all devices on the LAN; the "d" ("host") part identifies the
individual device.
With the router at its default IP address of "192.168.1.1", any
device on your LAN must have an address like "192.168.1.x". Any such
local device expects to be able to reach any other such local device
(say, "192.168.1.y") by just specifying that local destination address
for the message.
To send a message to an address with a different network part, like,
say "172.217.4.46", which is _not_ on your LAN, the local device would
need to send the message to a router (gateway), and hope that that
router knows how to get it delivered.
To make this stuff work, your computer needs to have its own address
on the same subnet as the router ("192.168.1.x", x > 1).
> [...] should my tftp be connecting to 192.168.1.10 and not
> 192.168.1.1? [...]
Nope. Your computer's address is "192.168.1.10"; your router's
address is "192.168.1.1". In the "tftp" command, you specify the
destination address, that of the router.
> 3. For the timing and reset button [...]
I have no special wisdom on that. I can tell you how to get the TFTP
program to talk to the router, but getting the router into a receptive
state is a different problem.