Build your own OpenWrt firmware for IPQ devices
This blog will help to build OpenWRT firmware for IPQ devices using feed-ipq
OpenWrt - An overview
OpenWrt is a Linux based Open-source Operating system which are primarily used on wireless routers and mesh devices. For users, OpenWrt means the freedom of full customization, allowing the use of an embedded device in ways the vendor never envisioned. Designed to be lightweight and efficient, OpenWrt is capable to run in range of hardware products, be it low memory Wi-Fi routers, CPE routers and so on.
OpenWrt supports a wide range of System-on-Chip (SoC) vendors including but not limited to Airoha, Broadcom, MediaTek, Qualcomm, Realtek. SoC vendor prefers OpenWrt based Operating System for their Wireless Routers, since it provides Various customization, Package management, Better Security features and a great Community support.
For Wireless chipsets in the routers, OpenWrt uses upstream/open-source version of network drivers and packages for their respective chipsets which are freely available and published into the open-source community.
Along with open-source contributions, SoC Vendors focus on developing the latest features, Enhancements and Bug fixes. While most of the features are published to the open-source community, Vendor specific features will be available only in through their External release repos until the packages and patches are upstreamed to the community.
Qualcomm Internet Processor (IPQ) in Wi-Fi Product line
Qualcomm is one of the leading SoC vendors for most of the wireless routers. Qualcomm Internet Processor (IPQ) refers to a series of System-on-Chip (SoC) designed specifically for Wi-Fi networking devices like routers, gateways and access points. IPQ807X, IPQ95XX and IPQ53XX are few of the latest Qualcomm SoC’s series available in the market and are utilized in the various enterprise, retail and carrier broadband products.
Qualcomm Wi-Fi chipset details are available in the Wiki Page.
Qualcomm provides releases to the Customer and open-source community for IPQ devices through Codelinaro website, whose source code can be downloaded based on the details here.
feed-ipq : Collection of package recipes for IPQ devices
feed-ipq is an OpenWrt feed repository which helps to build latest OpenWrt
firmware for Qualcomm Wi-Fi SoC platforms (IPQ Devices), which is on-par with
the latest release from Qualcomm. This feed can be easily integrated into
OpenWrt and OpenWrt based build systems like prplOS, IOWRT and openWiFi.
feed-ipq is available at, https://github.com/zilogic-systems/feed-ipq
feed-ipq is intended to be layered on-top of an OpenWrt providing only the
required packages and files relevant for bring-up of the networking and Wi-Fi
features in the IPQ devices. This repository contains OpenWrt Target directory
files for IPQ devices, Network, Wi-Fi drivers, packages and scripts.
These can be used along with other feeds of OpenWrt.
Directory structure
.
|-- feeds
| |-- clo-upstream
| |-- nss-host
| |-- platform_utils
| |-- ssdk
| `-- wlan_utils
|-- README.md
`-- targets
`-- ipq95xxDirectory structure of the feed-ipq is segregated based on the following
-
targets- contains IPQ targets like ipq95xx and target related configs, files and patches -
feeds- contains IPQ target specific drivers, packages and scripts -
feeds/clo-upstream- contains OpenWrt upstream components which are customized for IPQ targets
Build Artifacts
After Integrating feed-ipq into OpenWrt, Below are the List of OpenWrt Firmware Images generated for IPQ devices
-
Kernel_Image- build_dir/target-aarch64_cortex-a73+neon-vfpv4_musl/linux-ipq95xx_generic/qcom_rdp433-uImage.itb -
Rootfs_Image- build_dir/target-aarch64_cortex-a73+neon-vfpv4_musl/linux-ipq95xx_generic/root.squashfs
Flashing Instructions for IPQ devices
Generic Flashing Instructions
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In U-Boot prompt, Download the Firmware Image which needs to be flashed into the Target
tftpb <file_name>-
Once the Image is downloaded, Flash the image into the respective partition
flash <partition_name>Flashing in eMMC boards
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Execute the below set of commands to flash kernel and rootfs image into
IPQ emmc flash variant boards
tftpb <Kernel_Image> && flash 0:HLOS
tftpb <Rootfs_Image> && flash rootfsFlashing in NAND Boards
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Execute the below set of commands to flash kernel and rootfs image into
IPQ nand flash variant boards
tftpb <Kernel_Image> && flash kernel
tftpb <Rootfs_Image> && flash ubi_rootfsVerification of the built Image
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In the generated OpenWRT Image, We could able to validate the below features
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OpenWrt version - 24.10.0
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GCC version - GCC 13.3.0 r28427-6df0e3d02a
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Ethernet - WAN
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Ethernet - LAN
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WiFi Interface up and running
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WiFi Client connectivity - 2G
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WiFi Client connectivity - 5G
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Ping from AP to 2G client
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Ping from AP to 5G client
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Speed test in 2G client
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Speed test in 5G client
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Ethernet
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IP Address is assigned to the WAN Interface of the Target device.
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And Target device could able to reach Internet through WAN Network.
root@OpenWrt:~# ifconfig eth0
eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:03:7F:E6:D1:5E
inet addr:172.16.1.7 Bcast:172.16.255.255 Mask:255.255.0.0
inet6 addr: fd78:4c15:7f9d:0:203:7fff:fee6:d15e/64 Scope:Global
inet6 addr: 2a02:1234:420a:100b:203:7fff:fee6:d15e/64 Scope:Global
inet6 addr: fe80::203:7fff:fee6:d15e/64 Scope:Link
inet6 addr: fd78:4c15:7f9d::8f8/128 Scope:Global
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:1420 errors:0 dropped:390 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:45 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:259546 (253.4 KiB) TX bytes:5318 (5.1 KiB)
Base address:0x1000
root@OpenWrt:~#
root@OpenWrt:~# ping -c 5 8.8.8.8
PING 8.8.8.8 (8.8.8.8): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 8.8.8.8: seq=0 ttl=118 time=1.454 ms
64 bytes from 8.8.8.8: seq=1 ttl=118 time=1.293 ms
64 bytes from 8.8.8.8: seq=2 ttl=118 time=1.403 ms
64 bytes from 8.8.8.8: seq=3 ttl=118 time=1.261 ms
64 bytes from 8.8.8.8: seq=4 ttl=118 time=1.244 ms
--- 8.8.8.8 ping statistics ---
5 packets transmitted, 5 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 1.244/1.331/1.454 ms
root@OpenWrt:~#
root@OpenWrt:~# ping -c 5 google.com
PING google.com (142.250.71.14): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 142.250.71.14: seq=0 ttl=118 time=1.356 ms
64 bytes from 142.250.71.14: seq=1 ttl=118 time=1.395 ms
64 bytes from 142.250.71.14: seq=2 ttl=118 time=1.216 ms
64 bytes from 142.250.71.14: seq=3 ttl=118 time=1.214 ms
64 bytes from 142.250.71.14: seq=4 ttl=118 time=1.225 ms
--- google.com ping statistics ---
5 packets transmitted, 5 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 1.214/1.281/1.395 msWiFi
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WiFi Interfaces for all the Radios are up and running.
root@OpenWrt:~# iw dev
phy#0
Interface wlan0
ifindex 13
wdev 0x4
addr 00:03:7f:12:1b:1b
ssid feed-ipq-2g
type AP
Power mode: 0
link 0:
addr 00:03:7f:12:1b:1b
channel 6 (2437 MHz), width: 20 MHz, center1: 2437 MHz
txpower 29.00 dBm
Interface wlan2
ifindex 12
wdev 0x3
addr 00:03:7f:12:1d:1d
ssid feed-ipq-6g
type AP
Power mode: 0
link 0:
addr 00:03:7f:12:1d:1d
channel 49 (6195 MHz), width: 80 MHz, center1: 6225 MHz
txpower 21.00 dBm
Interface wlan1
ifindex 11
wdev 0x2
addr 00:03:7f:12:1c:1c
ssid feed-ipq-5g
type AP
Power mode: 0
link 0:
addr 00:03:7f:12:1c:1c
channel 36 (5180 MHz), width: 80 MHz, center1: 5210 MHz
txpower 28.00 dBm-
Verified WiFi Clients connectivity to 2G and 5G Radios.
root@OpenWrt:~# iwinfo wlan0 assoc
32:FF:B0:0E:1A:91 -55 dBm / -106 dBm (SNR 51) 10880 ms ago
RX: 172.0 MBit/s, HE-MCS 7, 20MHz, HE-NSS 2, HE-GI 0, HE-DCM 0 139 Pkts.
TX: 1.0 MBit/s 110 Pkts.
expected throughput: unknown
root@OpenWrt:~#
root@OpenWrt:~# iwinfo wlan1 assoc
FA:30:3B:77:11:84 -49 dBm / -106 dBm (SNR 57) 5950 ms ago
RX: 1200.9 MBit/s, HE-MCS 11, 80MHz, HE-NSS 2, HE-GI 0, HE-DCM 0 2350 Pkts.
TX: 432.3 MBit/s, HE-MCS 4, 80MHz, HE-NSS 2, HE-GI 0, HE-DCM 0 6169 Pkts.
expected throughput: unknown