Unbricking your linksys WRT54G
After bricking my wrt54g and attempting the most famous unbricking techniques of shorting out pins 15 and 16 didn’t work mainly because this is rumored to only work on version 1 of the WRT54G router. So I decided to make the connection to the router the most basic and hold down the reset button and all of a sudden I got the best news…..
To create the most simple connection I got on a windows XP machine did the following.
1. Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> Network Connections
2. Right Click on Local Area Connection and select Properties
3. In the “This connection uses the following items:” highlight Inernet Protocl (TCP/IP) and select Properties
4. Select Use the following IP address: and enter the following information
IP address: 192.168.1.2
Subnet mask: 255.255.255.0
Default gateway: 192.168.1.1
5. Click OK now you should be back to this screen.
6. Click the Configure button and you may see this screen. If so just click YES
7. Select the Advanced Tab the Link Speed & Duplex. The Value by Default is most likely Auto Detect. Go ahead a select 10Mbps/Half Duplex. This keeps the connection very simple.
8. Click OK and OK one more time. Plug your ethernet cable up to your computer and one of the 4 LAN ports on your WRT54G.
9. Open a command prompt. Start -> Run type in cmd and Enter. Then run the following command ping -t 192.168.1.1
10. Plug the power into the router and hold the reset button down for 30 seconds.
11. Soon after releasing the reset button you should start to see the ping replies from your router.
12. Next I downloaded the lastest firmware from Linksys. Make sure you select the correct firmware for your version of the router you have. I have the WRT54GV2. It is located on the bottom of your router.
13. After you update it with the linksys firmware you can then update it with your favorite open source version of some software.
Soon after writing this I found this which basically describes the same thing with some more things to try as well. See it on linksysinfo.org website.