Just yesterday, I couldn’t finish a 6GB transfer to my Seagate Central NAS because my wireless connection kept dropping. Found out that this is a common problem for the D-Link DIR-615 router. Only solution would be to update the firmware to DD-WRT.
So upgrade I did. These are the steps I took to complete the upgrade.
Download DD-WRT Firmware
Searched on the DD-WRT database if there was an update for my router, fortunately there was (revision C2).
The row doesn’t look like its an active link but just clicked on it and this is what showed up.
Then proceeded to download both firmware binaries. The first image is to flash DIR-615 to DD-WRT, the second image is to upgrade the DD-WRT firmware.
Update Firmware to DD-WRT
Connected D-Link DIR-615 directly to my computer via ethernet. Logged in to D-Link’s web interface. Under Tools -> Firmware, I uploaded the first image, dir615c1-factory-to-ddwrt-firmware.bin. Then hit the upload button.
Waited for a couple of minutes then the router became unreachable. Normal under these conditions since my D-Link router was configured to be accessed at this IP address, 192.168.0.1, after the DD-WRT firmware install, ip address defaults to 192.168.1.1.
Logged in to the web interface. Then went ahead and upgraded the firmware with the second image, dir615c1-firmware.bin. Found it via Administration Tab -> Firmware Upgrade.
After the reboot, wireless radio was off. For some quirky reason, I had to enable clone mac to get the radio on.
Then I used the following configuration for my Wireless network.
A couple of notes, throughout all the process I used the Firefox browser. I didn’t do any hex edits or did a any configuration reset.
Already threw around 50GB worth of files big and small and so far WiFi hasn’t dropped yet (crossing my fingers). So I guess I’m keeping this hardware for now, it’s not the fastest but it’s stable enough for my use.
Hope this helps ^_^
{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
I followed these steps and it doesn’t matter what internet browser I use, it will NEVER upload ANY version to the site. If I use IE, it hangs in “waiting for http://192.168.0.1/cgi/index… The progress bar stays stuck almost hal way thru. If I use FireFox, it shows no progress and the orange blinking light power disappears. How long does it really take to flash the bin image?
Hi Robert, it took about 3 to 5 minutes for the flash to finish. Do you have details as to what specific hardware you have?
Hi, I need a cheap router to run ddwrt with snmp support, can you check that yours have it? Some versions don´t have snmp.
Thanks!
Hi Alex, haven’t tried it yet. I’ll take a look one of these days when I have time, took it of my network since I’m using the router provided by my ISP.
I’m having all kinds of problems flashing to DD-WRT, I have a DIR-615 C1 version, tried Hex Editing to no avail I really want to use this old router for repeating is there any version of the .bin file that actually works!!!! very frustrated.
Hi Neil,
Did you try using Mozilla Firefox instead of Chrome? It could be a browser issue like mine was.
guys, those who may be having problems… You must connect Dlink directly using an ethernet cable, with the LAN slot 1-4 and the other end into your computer. I’m sure you already did that. HOWEVER something that may help is you have to configure your ETHERNET connection through control panel on your PC. Click the active LAN/ethernet network, click properties, and then double click on the IPv4. Click “use the following ip adress” and select: ip address: 192.168.0.2
subnet mask: 255.255.255.0
default gateway: 192.168.0.1 This will enable you to communicate with the router correctly. Also, click reset on the back of the router, hold for a few seconds, unplug power cord, wait 5 seconds, replug power cord and wait 15 seconds. Now it will take you to emergency boot mode when you type in 192.168.0.1 in your Firefox browser, and you can upload the firmware from there. Here’s the right forum link for you guys. Explains everything. Follow directions precisely. After you’re done, the NEW router IP is 192.168.1.1 Notice there’s a difference. As well, make sure you change your IPv4 TCIP settings to the “automatically optain ip adress,” your preferred DNS setting. Enjoy.
http://www.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=441247#441247
Hi Jeedo,
I am not able to access the ddwrt-database can you help me on this
hi bud i have download C2 but keeps coming up with the chosen file is not a vaild firmware image file any clues
Hi john,
What browser did you use to download the file? Did you try using FireFox?
i have replaced the firmware succesfully but I need to change to default IP 192.168.1.1 to 192.168.0.1 and then it won’t be accessible – bricked. how do i restore access to it? I could get a new one but old one still ok so it is a waste if I throw it away.
Hi Steve,
Sorry you got your hardware bricked. Not sure how you got it bricked though, changing the IP shouldn’t brick it. Are you sure you are not able to access it via 192.168.0.1?
The trick here is to reset the Router with method 30/30/30
I had all the problems you guys had earlier in the thread but I overcome using reset 30/30/30
Router was accessible from web emergency interface which let me to upgrade.
I hope it helps !
Thanks for mentioning the afte-flash IP of 1.1 – I read I don’t know how many threads on how to flash my 615-c1 and nobody mentioned it switched Ip’s from 0.1 to 1.1 – I had a heck of a time untill I stumbled onto this blog and when I punched in the majik numbers it came up..
At the time I was trying the 14896 build and when it took I immediately upgraded the final file to the 21061 build – no issues so far and wireless is working..
Thanks again.