@DmetZ 

On my Deco S7 some time ago I was able to save a config file locally, but after some app update they removed this option making only the cloud backup available. I have some backup files but they are unusable now. This is such a downgrade on this system. 

  @Riley_S 
 

The backup is supposed to be my property since it includes configs, passwords and network details which could be misused if leaked or accessed by someone who is unauthorized. The industry standard practice (even among many TP link routers) is to have a backup of config which can be exported locally to a PC or a USB drive. 

Not sure why this simplest of things are not implemented by TP Link for Deco. 

Since the backup is my property, I should have access and control to where it is kept. If I don't want it to be synced to TP Link Cloud then I should have that control. 

Please get this implemented.

  @IVASG Couldn't have said it better myself. This really is basic functionality that TP link appear to be locking behind more expensive hardware as I refuse to believe they are oblivious given how long they have been in the game and making products. It's clearly a marketing move to force people to upgrade to more expensive kit.

Very disappointing and is the reason people shouldn't buy TP Link Mesh routers and should look for alternatives.

I have an idea which may be better than nothing.

To save some information for your own use in the event of a disaster, you can print out or copy/save some of the data displayed in the app or web interface.

I'd rather have a printout of all my DHCP fixed addresses than nothing at all. I would save me quite a bit of time vs. running around the house trying to find the MAC IDs for every IoT device.

I agree entirely that the cloud backup is inadequate and inappropriate. I can't see it? Where is it? How does it get used for a restore?

Sierra

  @sbufe it's a great idea! I've got a spreadsheet with all my network devices, MAC addresses, IPs, open ports etc. for exactly that reason, but reconfiguring it is still a pain in the ass even with that as I've got over 50 devices to set up (not uncommon for those with smart homes or home labs). Hitting 'restore' and browsing to a locally hosted backup should be a basic ability that a lot of entry level and ISP provided routers can do

  @PavPev I just spent about 12 hours with the chat GPT guiding me to set up pihole on an Ubuntu VM running on Hyper-V on a nucbox. Lots of struggle trying to get the Ubuntu machine name to be recognizable by the windows machines on the network.

I created checkpoints and documentation along the way. Yay.

Original plan was to put a SMB server together to host a new Obsidian vault (to replace my Evernote subscription), but we got pulled onto a tangent with pihole and DNS. 

The Deco doesn't politely share machine names, so I created a hosts file on the PiHole, asking Chat GPT to help out by registering the tabular info copied from the Deco web config interface into a pretty hosts txt file.

We cleverly decided to save the MAC ID addresses in the same file by putting them after a hashtag symbol on the relevant line. It looks beautiful, I must say. The robot spaced the comments out so they form a straight column. 

So now I have that as a backup file, but of course, every time I add something to the router DHCP, I would want to go in and edit that hosts file on PiHole again.

PiHole is a terrible name. Seriously.

I think what is making me angrier than anything is that the app and documentation tell you that you can do this, you can turn on "auto backup", but there is no way that I can find to actually restore from this backup. I spent HOURS naming devices and reserving IPs and setting band preferences, etc. All gone. And it's the second time this has happened.

 

  @markstaben After several months of knowing I can backup to the cloud I still haven't.  By today I consider doing it just this time so I can install the BE85 unit I bought last year.  But I realize how do you restore from the cloud?! Makes no sense.  Half ass fix to keep us quiet until someone else really needs to use the backup, but can't figure out how to restore.  Doesn't help when our backup is in the cloud where all our passwords are kept in prob plain text.

  @sbufe Absolutely a clever alternative - but I don't feel we should have to be devising alternatives when a mesh system costing hundreds of pounds should have it built in to the software.

PiHole (since you mentioned it) has backup and restore ability, as does my Home Assistant, Plex and HyperHDR - so it's clearly not a difficult thing to implement as these free/open source platforms have done it.

@garyhgaryh 

@markstaben 

Welcome to the hall of mirrors 

It clearly hasn't worked to shut us up as we're still talking about it and TP Link are still ignoring it