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Since I have been in lockdown here in the UK with my family I decided to upgrade my existing wireless network which consisted of 3 x WNDAP350 to a better system.
I found on eBay a WC7520 controller with 3 WNDAP360 Access points, which would complement my existing access points and give me one point of control via the controller. Looked like a good idea, so I went for it.
The kit all arrived, could access devices individually as expected so all good.
I laid another 100 metres of cable in the house, and connected it all up, went to the controller, did the discovery, it found everything, fantastic, enter access points password , Then it kicked off.
All devices needed a firmware upgrade according to the controller, and then radio silence. All Access Points bricked!
I bought another couple of 360's off eBay which were reflashed and ready to go.. It bricked them as well.
I have managed to revive the 360's via console cable and refreshing the firmware,but the 350's are ready for the recycle bin. Its been an education learning how easy this is to do in Linux whereas in Windows10 land its a complete failure.
I have been trying for a number of days to get this kit working and in desperation am asking for someones assistance in getting this resolved for me.
I know this kit is an "End of Life" product in NETGEARs eyes, but if someone could give me an idiots guide to get this kit running, I would be eternally gratefull.
I have managed to resolve this by putting firmware version V2.2.11 onto the access point, which makes the access point completely configurable and does not need a controller.
The WNDAP360 can be used standalone with security, and independently configurable !
This makes this ideal for my home use and I now have 5 wifi access points from my Netgear POE switch with unique IP addresses which I have configured from within the web admin of the access point.
Yes its a little pain to change security settings in each access point, but for my home use, its great. Now got 100% signal in every room and in the garden 🙂
WC7520 now making its way onto eBay after a factory reset.
Hello Ken, Hope you and your loved ones are staying safe.
Have you decided to re-live the life of 2010-2014 era with 802.11N (wifi 4) days 🙂
Since most of the wireless clients support WiFi 5 (802.11AC). You will get the best benefits. If you check out WAC505, WAC510, WAC540, WAC564 and Insight or Orbi pro. all of them are off great value.
these are one of best access points in industry for that price.
If you like onPerm controller. WC7500 and WC7600v2 are better choices. They support both those older 11N AP and also newer Wi-Fi 5 AP like WAC720.
Coming to your question on WC7520. I am not sure where you are stuck. What firmware version you are running on AP and controller when you start discovering.
You may have to start with WNDAP360 firmwares that were released in 2012 or 2013 and discover it from WC7520. So that when WC7520 pushes the firmware to AP, the AP firmwar can handle this older firmwares.
There was some upgrade rules to follow as we moved from unencrypted config to encrypted config in 2013.
you can go to console of these APs and check out some of CLIs.
If I recall correctly, 1) you need to factory reset those AP and load stand alone firmware 3.7.9.0. 2) load 2.5.0.47 on controller. Do a factory reset. 3) Discovery and convert standalone AP to Controller managed APs. Good luck. The above WC7520 tips are NOT verified and should not be considered as official support answers.
Stay safe and wishes for good health and great Wi-Fi. Thank you for your support of Netgear. Let is know how your experiments go. Hope to see you choose our Insight and WAC510/WAC540/WAC564 to get to current world.
The Controller is up to firmware version 2.5.0.47 and I had reflashed the WNDAP360's with the latest firmware available V 3.7.11.4.
Following your advice I have, via the web based admin page for the Access Point, downgraded the firmware to version V 3.7.9.0, factory reset everything and started again, just with a single access point.
The controller discovered the AP, and I had my console connected to it so that I could see what was going on.
After I pressed the add button I saw that the AP terminated the its system and thenerased and copied a new kernal and rootfs images before Restarting the system.
In the console it did lots of stuff and it ended being being served an IP address by the DHCP server on my router and binding itself to 192.168.1.152.
The access point has now the power light flashing amber and the activity light flickering green and the LAN light a constant green, and does not appear to be doing anything else.
The controller is saying that the AP is rebooting.
If you could please offer up any further advice it much be much appreciated.
I have managed to resolve this by putting firmware version V2.2.11 onto the access point, which makes the access point completely configurable and does not need a controller.
The WNDAP360 can be used standalone with security, and independently configurable !
This makes this ideal for my home use and I now have 5 wifi access points from my Netgear POE switch with unique IP addresses which I have configured from within the web admin of the access point.
Yes its a little pain to change security settings in each access point, but for my home use, its great. Now got 100% signal in every room and in the garden 🙂
WC7520 now making its way onto eBay after a factory reset.
Onto my next lockdown project.
Regards
Kev
Model: WNDAP380Rv2|ProSafe Dual Band Wireless-N Access Point with RFID support
Just as a follow-up to this, I ended up with the WC7520 Controller and a spare access point which I now know how to fix up as a fully configurable access point via console cable and tftp, It been an interesting learning experience, and now have my main PC dual booting to Linux as Windows 10 was making the task impossible to tftp.
My theory was that as I rolled back the firmware on my access point to something that worked, the same may work with the controller.
I loaded the controller with the oldest firmware and updated it until it could find the WNDAP360's on the network.(2.5.0.5), and then tried to add the spare controller.. It bricked it. I put the WNDAP360 back to firmware revision V2.2.11 so that the device is usable in my home network.
The WC7520 be be retired on eBay after giving it my best attempt, maybe other Access Points will work with it... God Bless
