linksys WRT54G extreme cooling mods

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ryuji

2[H]4U
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Jun 11, 2004
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photos are father down
i got more photos if anyone is interested, but i doubt i need to say more other then the heat sink still gets warm to touch :eek: but perhaps that is expected since i have the power output at 8 times the normal output :D
 
Can I ask what the benefit of doing this is? I'm sure your computer, wherever it may be, would pickup the wireless link fine, and it's not like it's going to increase your connection speed.. I enjoy mods.. but they're always a lot better when they actually server a purpose..
 
actualy, it was unstable because of heat, wireless would drop out and i would feel the router and it would be hot to touch, i did the screen and it fixed it but under extreme load it would still act up, like randomly rebooting and dropping wireless again, so i felt the pcb and found that the cpu was literaly burning hot, so i put a small heat sink on it to be modest, still got hot, so i said screw it and put a big ass zalman heat sink on it and it seems perfectly sized for it, since it only gets warm

also belive it or not, the heat sink brought max network utilisation from 75 or so % going to my laptops 5400 rpm drive to about 85-90%
 
Oh4Sh0 said:
Can I ask what the benefit of doing this is? I'm sure your computer, wherever it may be, would pickup the wireless link fine, and it's not like it's going to increase your connection speed.. I enjoy mods.. but they're always a lot better when they actually server a purpose..
Click to expand...

Have you felt the internals of it? They get bitchin' hot and have led to instability... guess what this mod fixes :D
 
ScHpAnKy said:
Have you felt the internals of it? They get bitchin' hot and have led to instability... guess what this mod fixes :D
Click to expand...
i think i own the most stable wrt54g now... it does ~350-400 feet of wifi range too, 54 mbits up to 250 feet easy and if the laptop had a good antenna i would not be surprised if it got a good 500 feet or so
 
Oh4Sh0 said:
Can I ask what the benefit of doing this is? I'm sure your computer, wherever it may be, would pickup the wireless link fine, and it's not like it's going to increase your connection speed.. I enjoy mods.. but they're always a lot better when they actually server a purpose..
Click to expand...

Power = Range

He could be in an area with high interference or sharing his net with neighbors or needing long range (laptop at the lake anyone? :D)
 
i actualy didnt want to have it looking overkill, i started off with modest small heat sinks but they got too hot and i stepped up to the big zalman, the zalman appears to be the perfect one for the job tho :D :cool: i heat sink'd the lan PHY to make sure that no LAN activity can get the router unstable
 
The_Mage18 said:
Power = Range

He could be in an area with high interference or sharing his net with neighbors or needing long range (laptop at the lake anyone? :D)
Click to expand...
i wanted the range, and i live next to power lines, which even reduces the range on my mx-1000 :(
 
I do remember my WRT54g getting pretty toasty during loads. Amazingly enough, my Dlink 4300 runs nice and cool even heavy loads.
 
i dont trust d-link after my old router, and netgear isnt great either after seeing my friends, linksys hasnt failed me yet
 
D-Link sucks. I bought a wireless router from them, then decided screw it, so I bought a different PCI card from them, and it didn't work good either, so I said screw that. So then I decided, fuck it, and I went back to my old Linksys router and decided to run a cable from my room to my basement. One day, I decided to try the D-Link router again, and it started DROPPING my wired connection, so I updated the firmware and it started dropping it again. Back to the Linksys it was.

Linksys = Peachy.
 
you expect any less from a subdivision of cisco systems? they are undebatably the leader in enterprise networking as far as i know what makes the wrt54g great is the fact that there are 3rd party projects for the firmware, adding the features that linksys never did
 
I have the same router and its dropping the wireless a lot. I'm interested in moding my router as well. For some reason the images you posted are not showing up so can you explain what you did to boost your wireless and make it stable? I would still like to take a look at your images as well.
 
ryuji said:
you expect any less from a subdivision of cisco systems? they are undebatably the leader in enterprise networking as far as i know what makes the wrt54g great is the fact that there are 3rd party projects for the firmware, adding the features that linksys never did
Click to expand...
:|

Cisco is t3h overpriced junk. Besides, if you want REALLY high quality routers, buy a Juniper :D (This coming from the guy with a Cisco 7204 in his basement... :D)

As for D-Link... *counts on fingers*
4 NICs, 1 router (wired, not wireless), and 2 switches. Never had any problems with any of them, and the NICs have to be at least 3 years old, as well as one of the switches.
 
I love D-Link.

I had a wireless router and wireless game adapter from Linksys die 2 days after the 4 month warrenty, and they refused to replace it. Hard to see over $200 go down the drain like that.
 
I run OpenWRT with signal boosting to 88, I believe. It works wonders and if I keep WEP low and use MAC address filtering I get even better range in an area that's covered in interfering networks and pwer fields.
 
Get you some ZyXEL. Good stuffs. ;)

::edit:: rehost those pics somewhere so us latecomers can see them.

 
I'm still waiting for Linksys to release an OFFICAL firmware to deal with the "wireless disconnects while tranferring large files" problem that has gained a 26 page, 507 response thread on linksysinfo.org HERE

I know there's a beta out there, but I don't want to brick my router. I haven't tried the WRT or Alchemy firmwares because my wireless rig isn't the far away and only between one wall, so I don't need the added power.
 
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I have the same router, and I'm right near a radio station... want to talk about interference... how about a 100' radio tower :p I didn't even know you could flash the firmware to something other than linksys' firmware. And a heatsink? That's great! Any links you could share would be great... my wireless gets absolutely CRAPPY after 10:30 at night... I think the radio station is allowed to boost their signal at that time... 'cause I end up not being able to get any signal at all even 15' away with clear line of sight. It's really pissing me off that I have to keep a long ethernet cable sitting around because there are times when I get absolutely no signal from my wireless... and I already upgraded the antennas with better ones, to no avail.

-Nate
 
Nate Finch said:
I have the same router, and I'm right near a radio station... want to talk about interference... how about a 100' radio tower :p I didn't even know you could flash the firmware to something other than linksys' firmware. And a heatsink? That's great! Any links you could share would be great... my wireless gets absolutely CRAPPY after 10:30 at night... I think the radio station is allowed to boost their signal at that time... 'cause I end up not being able to get any signal at all even 15' away with clear line of sight. It's really pissing me off that I have to keep a long ethernet cable sitting around because there are times when I get absolutely no signal from my wireless... and I already upgraded the antennas with better ones, to no avail.

-Nate
Click to expand...

what's wrong with staying strictly wired?
 
the alchemy firmware and others allow you to boost the output power by 8 or more times, i just chose to stop at 8
 
ScHpAnKy said:
what's wrong with staying strictly wired?
Click to expand...

For one, I'm sharing internet with a friend in another apartment... kinda hard to do sans wireless. Second, I paid for all this wireless equipment, it had damn well better work! Third, I got it because I have computers in multiple rooms and didn't want to have wires running everywhere.

Finally... Wires suck. It's 2005... I shouldn't be stuck with technology from a decade ago :)

-Nate
 
Nate Finch said:
Finally... Wires suck. It's 2005... I shouldn't be stuck with technology from a decade ago :)

-Nate
Click to expand...


wired > wireless as far as reliability and interference go.
 
...and if you're worried about the technology, you could always switch your network to fiber...

::edit::
:rolleyes:

 
I bought 9Dbi gain antennas from CompUSA in-store for $50. They're pretty sweet... except when the radio station near my apartment decides to turn up the juice and knock everything out :p

-Nate
 
personaly, i do not trust ANYTHING from compusa to work as advertised unless its made and sold as a major brand name im betting those antennas are not omnidirectional?
 
Well... You actually can get quite a bit stronger than 7db for less than $50 if you happen to live in an area where it's... ummm... legalish. I'm no radio tech but I believe you can do up to 15db antennas on the linksys without trampling FCC regs assuming you don't have the power jacked up from default. I bought some patch panels from these guys for a recent long range link project, they have some really powerful stuff as well. http://www.hyperlinktech.com/ They have a $100 minimum order last I looked but they have a link to one of their resellers who has no such limit (But they're a bit more expensive).


PS: No flame war itent here, so if anyone who has more knowledge of wifi then me knows the exact specs to stay without FCC regs feel free to correct me.
 
Oh4Sh0 said:
Can I ask what the benefit of doing this is? I'm sure your computer, wherever it may be, would pickup the wireless link fine, and it's not like it's going to increase your connection speed.. I enjoy mods.. but they're always a lot better when they actually server a purpose..
Click to expand...

Oh no! You mean now we have to do practical mods? No more cosmetic stuff? Vendors with overstock of neons, LED fans, window kits, wire sleeve, UV dye and paint, etc are all defenestrating themselves right now.

Hmmm... maybe that would be a good thing. Merchants could have a mass suicide sale or something and I could stock up on useless, though pretty, mod supplies.
 
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