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TL-WDR4300 showing system error, unable to reset

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TL-WDR4300 showing system error, unable to reset

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TL-WDR4300 showing system error, unable to reset
TL-WDR4300 showing system error, unable to reset
2016-08-19 20:11:07
Model : TL-WDR4300

Hardware Version : 1.3

Firmware Version : TL-WDR4300_V1_150302

ISP : n/a

Hello,

per the owner's manual, my router is showing a system error (i.e. the SYS light is off) and I cannot access or reset it.

The router is still broadcasting wireless over both 2.4 and 5GHz and the ethernet ports seems to work, but in all three cases it no longer gives out client IP addresses. When connected using ethernet, my PC gets assigned a completely random IP (and subnet mask is 255.255.0.0, gateway is blank). The default values (192.168.0.1/24) do not work and I am unable to ping the router. The device was always working fine without any hiccups. Last action I did successfully was to add an IP into the DHCP reservation list via the web interface (which prompted a reboot). There were no power outages or anything out of the ordinary to suggest a failed reboot, but it hasn't worked since.

The hardware reset method does not work. Whether I hold the hw reset button for 8sec/30+sec or keep pressed when turning on the device, it does not reset. Sometimes the WPS light comes on for a few seconds when I try to hw reboot. If an ethernet cable is plugged in, then the respective LED blinks. Only permanent light is the power LED.

I contacted TP-LINK's phone support in my country, but was told that it's most likely a dead router and that they cannot repair it. The device is out of warranty, but I refuse to throw it away without trying to fix it first. Surface inspection of the PCB does not show any obvious damage (e.g. blown capacitors), and given it's status I believe it's a SW issue.

So, my question is; what can I do next to try to fix this? I have found there is an option of re-uploading stock firmware via TFTP, but is that possible without first using a special Serial-USB cable (which I do not have)? Is that even necessary (i.e. should I suspect that the firmware is corrupt) or is this something else (stuck bootloader)?

Would really appreciate any help. I am no tech-expert, but will try anything that is suggested. Thanks.
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Re:TL-WDR4300 showing system error, unable to reset
2016-08-29 23:05:56
This is a follow up based on all the suggestions I could find online:

1) TFTP server option
I tried connecting the router directly to my PC using a patch cable. Unfortunately, I could not see any traffic with Wireshark. Granted, I am no wireshark expert, but the only ARP packets that were captured were from the PC. Regardless, I tried setting up the PC as a TFTP server (blindly, using the IP 192.168.1.66), but this did not work either. I tried all this with the WAN as well as LAN1 ports.

2) USB-UART TTL RS232 adapter
As I understand it, the serial cable method is the last possible method of fixing this. Unfortunately, I did not get a resolution this way, although at least I got something from the router.
Using the classic Serial values 115200 and Flow control OFF (in PuTTY), I actually did get feedback from the router.

Every time I started up the router, I got the following:

[CODE]
[ 0.000000] Linux version 2.6.31--LSDK-9.2.0_U6.616 (root@liaozhiming) (gcc version 4.3.3 (GCC) ) #1 Mon May 18 19:25:55 CST 2015

[ 0.000000] Ram size passed from bootloader =128M

[ 0.000000] flash_size passed from bootloader = 8

[ 0.000000] CPU revision is: 0001974c (MIPS 74Kc)

[ 0.000000] ath_sys_frequency: cpu srif ddr srif cpu 560 ddr 450 ahb 225

[ 0.000000] Determined physical RAM map:

[ 0.000000] memory: 08000000 @ 00000000 (usable)

[ 0.000000] Zone PFN ranges:

[ 0.000000] Normal 0x00000000 -> 0x00008000

[ 0.000000] Movable zone start PFN for each node

[ 0.000000] early_node_map[1] active PFN ranges

[ 0.000000] 0: 0x00000000 -> 0x00008000

[ 0.000000] Built 1 zonelists in Zone order, mobility grouping on. Total pages: 32512

[ 0.000000] Kernel command line: console=ttyS0,115200 root=31:02 rootfstype=squashfs init=/sbin/init mtdparts=ath-nor0:128k(u-boot),1024k(kernel),6848k(rootfs),128k(config),64k(ART) mem=128M

[ 0.000000] PID hash table entries: 512 (order: 9, 2048 bytes)

[ 0.000000] Dentry cache hash table entries: 16384 (order: 4, 65536 bytes)

[ 0.000000] Inode-cache hash table entries: 8192 (order: 3, 32768 bytes)

[ 0.000000] Primary instruction cache 64kB, VIPT, 4-way, linesize 32 bytes.

[ 0.000000] Primary data cache 32kB, 4-way, VIPT, cache aliases, linesize 32 bytes

[ 0.000000] Writing ErrCtl register=00000000

[ 0.000000] Readback ErrCtl register=00000000

[ 0.000000] Memory: 112896k/131072k available (1856k kernel code, 17996k reserved, 432k data, 120k init, 0k highmem)

[ 0.000000] NR_IRQS:128

[ 0.000000] plat_time_init: plat time init done

[ 0.000000] Calibrating delay loop... 279.55 BogoMIPS (lpj=559104)

[ 0.096000] Mount-cache hash table entries: 512

[ 0.096000]

[ 0.096000] ****************ALLOC***********************

[ 0.096000] Packet mem: 8026e4c0 (0xe00000 bytes)

[ 0.096000] ********************************************

[ 0.096000]

[ 0.096000] NET: Registered protocol family 16

[ 0.096000] PCI init:ath_pcibios_init

[ 0.096000] ath_pcibios_init(294): PCI CMD write: 0x356

[ 0.096000] registering PCI controller with io_map_base unset

[ 0.096000] bio: create slab at 0

[ 0.096000] pci 0000:00:00.0: PME# supported from D0 D1 D3hot

[ 0.096000] pci 0000:00:00.0: PME# disabled

[ 0.096000] Returning IRQ 64

[ 0.100000] NET: Registered protocol family 2

[ 0.100000] IP route cache hash table entries: 1024 (order: 0, 4096 bytes)

[ 0.100000] TCP established hash table entries: 4096 (order: 3, 32768 bytes)

[ 0.100000] TCP bind hash table entries: 4096 (order: 2, 16384 bytes)

[ 0.100000] TCP: Hash tables configured (established 4096 bind 4096)

[ 0.100000] TCP reno registered

[ 0.100000] NET: Registered protocol family 1

[ 0.100000] ATH GPIOC major 0

[ 0.100000] squashfs: version 4.0 (2009/01/31) Phillip Lougher

[ 0.100000] msgmni has been set to 220

[ 0.100000] Block layer SCSI generic (bsg) driver version 0.4 loaded (major 254)

[ 0.100000] io scheduler noop registered

[ 0.100000] io scheduler deadline registered (default)

[ 0.100000] Serial: 8250/16550 driver, 1 ports, IRQ sharing disabled

[ 0.104000] serial8250.0: ttyS0 at MMIO 0xb8020000 (irq = 19) is a 16550A

[ 0.104000] console [ttyS0] enabled

[ 0.404000] PPP generic driver version 2.4.2

[ 0.408000] NET: Registered protocol family 24

[ 0.412000] 5 cmdlinepart partitions found on MTD device ath-nor0

[ 0.416000] Creating 5 MTD partitions on "ath-nor0":

[ 0.424000] 0x000000000000-0x000000020000 : "u-boot"

[ 0.428000] 0x000000020000-0x000000120000 : "kernel"

[ 0.432000] 0x000000120000-0x0000007d0000 : "rootfs"

[ 0.440000] 0x0000007d0000-0x0000007f0000 : "config"

[ 0.444000] 0x0000007f0000-0x000000800000 : "ART"

[ 0.448000] ->Oops: flash id 0xef4017 .

[ 0.452000] ----TP IGMP has been init------

[ 0.456000] TCP cubic registered

[ 0.460000] NET: Registered protocol family 10

[ 0.468000] NET: Registered protocol family 17

[ 0.472000] 802.1Q VLAN Support v1.8 Ben Greear

[ 0.476000] All bugs added by David S. Miller

[ 0.484000] athwdt_init: Registering WDT success

[ 0.488000] ath_otp_init: Registering OTP success

[ 0.492000] ath_clksw_init: Registering Clock Switch Interface success

[ 0.508000] VFS: Mounted root (squashfs filesystem) readonly on device 31:2.

[ 0.516000] Freeing unused kernel memory: 120k freed

[ 0.876000] unlzma/peek_old_byte: position 8700918 out of range

[ 0.880000] SQUASHFS error: crypto_decompress_update returned -25874, data probably corrupt

[ 0.888000] SQUASHFS error: squashfs_read_data failed to read block 0x8ed6b

[ 0.896000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read fragment cache entry [8ed6b]

[ 0.904000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read page, block 8ed6b, size 5936

[ 0.912000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read fragment cache entry [8ed6b]

[ 0.916000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read page, block 8ed6b, size 5936

[ 0.924000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read fragment cache entry [8ed6b]

[ 0.932000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read page, block 8ed6b, size 5936

[ 0.936000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read fragment cache entry [8ed6b]

[ 0.944000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read page, block 8ed6b, size 5936

[ 0.952000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read fragment cache entry [8ed6b]

[ 0.956000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read page, block 8ed6b, size 5936

[ 0.964000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read fragment cache entry [8ed6b]

[ 0.972000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read page, block 8ed6b, size 5936

[ 0.976000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read fragment cache entry [8ed6b]

[ 0.984000] SQUASHFS error: Unable to read page, block 8ed6b, size 5936

[ 0.992000] Failed to execute /sbin/init. Attempting defaults...

[ 0.996000] Kernel panic - not syncing: No init found. Try passing init= option to kernel.

[/CODE]

Somehow, this was always preceded with some corrupt text. It was different each time. Here is an example:

[CODE]
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f▒X.
▒▒镁8MB▒▒▒▒▒or ▒▒▒▒= 1&j
▒P▒*▒▒Y▒z-▒!!!!▒C▒▒K▒ ▒▒ɥ▒l▒+͡▒ 8j 5▒UsZk▒▒YVձt e˥ɽ▒menW▒
▒▒▒▒▒▒ialC▒▒i ▒▒▒▒▒
Net'
▒934}▒▒▒▒_i▒ZW+▒ize▒▒j
▒
▒▒lid▒Xɕss ▒
2▒▒sh.*ͥ▒▒ fi▒▒▒addr宮H▒ W▒▒ re▒Yj▒sk:㚚▒▒ ▒
WP*j---▒S1▒▒!e▒*
: c▒V▒▒▒ c֖▒▒▒11S▒eth▒ bX'▒▒2▒▒cY'▒Ң1
at议▒▒ɕ▒}▒nit'▒▒▒le▒YC▒eth0▒]5
Y
j
et
b▒▒k ▒▒5
Usin*ѡA deWk▒5
TF▒2ɽm s▒.▒Ɂ192)▒▒r▒.66' z▒▒IP▒Xɕss ▒.▒ʒ▒16r0.▒S▒FZ+▒▒▒e '▒▒300v▒▒▒}▒eco▒Y▒▒bin'▒HL▒X
▒dre▒.'▒▒▒00▒▒▒j
LoXV ▒▒▒ *▒T▒T #$▒▒▒ingʵ▒▒▒ at▒f0&▒▒▒...C!▒▒▒▒▒pre▒▒▒▒Ker▒▒▒Imag▒rrr▒OK▒▒HhE▒▒ѥ▒g ▒Y. ▒▒ ..▒C▒H▒Bo▒▒▒▒AthY▒k▒AR9▒)▒
[/CODE]



This is problematic, because I cannot proceed any further because of the corrupt text. Even though I tried (successfully) typing "tpl" during initial startup (which I cannot see, but have to guess), I get similar looking garbage, so typing tftpboot does not give me anything legible.
Any ideas why this may be and how to fix it?
I still think this is a SW issue and should therefore be repairable.
Also, the reset button works. If I press it, it is shown in PuTTY. The same goes for long-pressing it (8 seconds?), where it even shows that it is restoring to defaults, but nothing happens. One last thing that is strange is that there is no autobooting. Once the kernel panic line shows up, it hangs there until I turn it off/on again.
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