Gargoyle on Archer A7

General discussion about Gargoyle, OpenWrt or anything else even remotely related to the project

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BogMonster
Posts: 14
Joined: Sun Oct 30, 2022 5:51 am

Re: Gargoyle on Archer A7

Post by BogMonster »

Well, I finally got back to this and unfortunately it looks like it doesn't work, at least not for what I wanted to do.

I successfully updated the router to OpenWRT first and then uploaded the Gargoyle sysupgrade file. That appeared to work, after a bit of a blip. The final step was to restore the router config copied from my other Gargoyle. Now it just sits there flashing the power light sometimes and the 2.4G wifi light sometimes, and does nothing else, won't connect by wired or wireless, and won't reset.

I guess it's toast?

ispyisail
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Location: New Zealand

Re: Gargoyle on Archer A7

Post by ispyisail »

try serial cable to fix?

BogMonster
Posts: 14
Joined: Sun Oct 30, 2022 5:51 am

Re: Gargoyle on Archer A7

Post by BogMonster »

I'm out of my depth technically with that - wouldn't even know where to start. The router doesn't have a serial port if you mean RS232 - only internet in, network out and a single USB port. I've looked up and tried the TP Link recovery process but I guess resetting it takes it back to some version of Gargoyle or maybe even OpenWRT that isn't working.

I can't get the PC to communicate with it at all on the wired network cable, though there's a fair chance I didn't understand the instructions on the youtube video - and that was for the TP-Link recovery process anyway, using something called TFTP64, but I couldn't make head or tail of that it just kept telling me things I didn't understand so I put it back in the sin drawer to reflect on its future!

Lantis
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Location: Australia

Re: Gargoyle on Archer A7

Post by Lantis »

Failsafe should still work fine. And TFTP recovery should still be possible.

Restoring a config from a different model is an absolute no no, as you have found out.
http://lantisproject.com/downloads/gargoyle_ispyisail.php for the latest releases
Please be respectful when posting. I do this in my free time on a volunteer basis.

BogMonster
Posts: 14
Joined: Sun Oct 30, 2022 5:51 am

Re: Gargoyle on Archer A7

Post by BogMonster »

Yes, I was trying to save time and didn't see why it wouldn't work, given that it's the settings and not the firmware I assumed it would transfer. Hey ho. More haste less speed!

If I do manage to do a reset on the router, what will it go back to? Will it go right back to the original TP-LINK firmware, or the OpenWRT, or the Gargoyle upgrade to OpenWRT? I don't mind which at this point, as I can work with anything that will talk to the PC, I'd just rather something that works than putting it in the bin and it won't talk to anything at the moment.

If it's going to reset to the Gargoyle firmware, is there a post on here detailing the recovery of a bricked Gargoyle router that somebody could point me to please? I had a look but didn't see anything, will try a better search.

BogMonster
Posts: 14
Joined: Sun Oct 30, 2022 5:51 am

Re: Gargoyle on Archer A7

Post by BogMonster »

If it's relevant (and it may not be) when you switch the router on it does the following:

Power light comes on solid for a short time
Power light starts blinking (2-3 blinks per second)
2.4GHZ wifi light comes on (power still blinking)
Both lights start blinking
Goes through a sequence of power blinking/wifi solid and both blinking for about a minute or so
Eventually settles on both lights being solid. No other lights show at any point, if there is a cable connection to the PC this isn't registered.

BogMonster
Posts: 14
Joined: Sun Oct 30, 2022 5:51 am

Re: Gargoyle on Archer A7

Post by BogMonster »

Success!

After a lot of mucking about which I couldn't now describe, and reading a few threads on here, I managed to get it into recovery mode (fast blinking power light), connect to it using Putty and a manually set IP address through the recovery mode, log in and initiate a reset to initial settings so I now have it running with Gargoyle 1.13 and operating normally so I can set it up manually when I get the time. Phew! Thanks for the assistance - without the resources on here it would have been in the bin :)

Lantis
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Joined: Mon Jan 05, 2015 5:33 am
Location: Australia

Re: Gargoyle on Archer A7

Post by Lantis »

Excellent!
Yes by the description of the lights flashing and then going solid, it sounds like it was actually booting successfully, but because it had a bad config the network was not accessible. This is actually a good sign because it means that 99% of the time failsafe recovery is possible :)

Glad it is working for you now.
http://lantisproject.com/downloads/gargoyle_ispyisail.php for the latest releases
Please be respectful when posting. I do this in my free time on a volunteer basis.

BogMonster
Posts: 14
Joined: Sun Oct 30, 2022 5:51 am

Re: Gargoyle on Archer A7

Post by BogMonster »

For the forum record, on my TP-Link Archer A7 AC1750 I successfully used the following files to flash Gargoyle 1.13:

Initial flash to OpenWRT from the TP-Link GUI
openwrt-22.03.2-ath79-generic-tplink_archer-a7-v5-squashfs-factory.bin

Second flash to Gargoyle from the OpenWRT GUI
gargoyle_1.13.0-ath79-generic-tplink_archer-a7-v5-squashfs-sysupgrade.bin

Just don't do what I did and try and restore a configuration from another Gargoyle to save time - it doesn't!! :mrgreen:

No guarantees from me, but it's what worked on mine. Dec 2022, router purchased new from B&H in October, says v5.8 on the back.

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