yes... in the uboot source there is some nss code... problem is the dts file i think...
The NSS firmware is loaded by the qca-nss-drv driver. The firmware is > 400KB which is not possible to have been loaded by U-Boot. Besides the factory firmware is using the same U-Boot.
As for DTS, I have (I think) the nescessary info from CodeAurora. But the CodeAurora linux kernel (v4.4) has been heavily modified from the standard Linux source so that is a problem for me as well.
Here's from hnyman's master build:
Features for br-lan:
rx-checksumming: off [fixed]
tx-checksumming: on
tx-checksum-ipv4: off [fixed]
tx-checksum-ip-generic: on
tx-checksum-ipv6: off [fixed]
tx-checksum-fcoe-crc: off [fixed]
tx-checksum-sctp: off [fixed]
scatter-gather: off
tx-scatter-gather: off [requested on]
tx-scatter-gather-fraglist: off [requested on]
tcp-segmentation-offload: off
But it also depends on what iface you are looking at, so I'm a bit confused why it shows different settings for them.
the interface should be br-lan
There is now a new patch for bumping the kernel to 4.14:
http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/lede-dev/2018-April/011895.html
and the issues I've found on the nbg6817 (PCIe fails to initialize, therefore no wlan, kernel size too large for the r7800 - not an issue for the nbg6817):
http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/lede-dev/2018-April/011900.html
1 Like
A very initial test on the nbg6817 (https://github.com/pkgadd/openwrt/tree/ath10k-firmware-features-1) looks positive, I'll file that branch as pull request after a few days of testing.
http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/ath10k/2018-April/011269.html
"just for your notice. 10.4.3.5.3-0057 on 9984 which was just released
crashes in vht160 operation mode immediatly after first station associates
last known working stable fw so far is 10.4-3.4-00104. the whole
10.4.3.5.3 series seem to be seriously broken or the api has been
changed in a way
which is unsupported by ath10k (which i think is the cause of the problem)
it would be good to know what has been changed." 
can confirm this...
I had noticed recently that the WIFI-speed was lower than before, especially on 5GHz. I wondered whether the 3.5.3-firmware was to blame. Will roll back to 3.4 to find out....
ath10k for QCA9984 updated once again
Perhaps it fixes the issues described above?
"This release includes a new DFS host confirmation feature for better regulatory
enforcement. This means that, when using AP mode, DFS channels in FCC regulatory
region won't work without the corresponding ath10k patch:
ath10k: DFS host confirmation"
And a bit more info on this release: http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/ath10k/2018-May/011376.html
1 Like
Hello Hnyman,
Could you help me to recover my R7800 with serial recovery?
U-Boot 2012.07 [local,local] (Sep 03 2015 - 17:33:28)
U-boot 2012.07 dni1 V0.4 for DNI HW ID: 29764958 NOR flash 0MB; NAND flash 128MB; RAM 512MB; 1st Radio 4x4; 2nd Radio 4x4; Cascade
smem ram ptable found: ver: 0 len: 5
DRAM: 491 MiB
NAND: SF: Unsupported manufacturer 00
ipq_spi: SPI Flash not found (bus/cs/speed/mode) = (0/0/48000000/0)
128 MiB
MMC:
*** Warning - bad CRC, using default environment
PCI0 Link Intialized
PCI1 Link Intialized
In: serial
Out: serial
Err: serial
131072 bytes read: OK
MMC Device 0 not found
cdp: get part failed for 0:HLOS
Net: MAC1 addr:b0:7f:b9:xx:xx:xx
athrs17_reg_init: complete
athrs17_vlan_config ...done
S17c init done
MAC2 addr:b0:7f:b9:xx:xx:xx
eth0, eth1
Hit any key to stop autoboot: 0
Client starts...[Listening] for ADVERTISE...TTT
Retry count exceeded; boot the image as usual
nmrp server is stopped or failed !
Loading from device 0: nand0 (offset 0x1480000)
** check kernel image **
Verifying Checksum ... OK
** check rootfs image **
Verifying Checksum ... OK
MMC Device 0 not found
Loading from nand0, offset 0x1480000
Image Name: Linux-3.4.103
Image Type: ARM Linux Kernel Image (uncompressed)
Data Size: 2176056 Bytes = 2.1 MiB
Load Address: 41508000
Entry Point: 41508000
Automatic boot of image at addr 0x44000000 ...
Image Name: Linux-3.4.103
Image Type: ARM Linux Kernel Image (uncompressed)
Data Size: 2176056 Bytes = 2.1 MiB
Load Address: 41508000
Entry Point: 41508000
Verifying Checksum ... OK
Loading Kernel Image ... OK
OK
mtdparts variable not set, see 'help mtdparts'
no partitions defined
defaults:
mtdids : nand0=msm_nand
mtdparts: none
info: "mtdparts" not set
Using machid 0x136c from environment
Starting kernel ...
Booting Linux on physical CPU 0
Linux version 3.4.103 (voxel@dell) (gcc version 4.8.5 (GCC) ) #1 SMP Mon Apr 2 16:46:32 UTC 2018
CPU: ARMv7 Processor [512f04d0] revision 0 (ARMv7), cr=10c5387d
CPU: PIPT / VIPT nonaliasing data cache, PIPT instruction cache
Machine: Qualcomm Atheros AP161 reference board
QCA command line: console=ttyHSL1,115200n8
DNI command line: console=ttyHSL1,115200n8 ubi.mtd=netgear root=/dev/mtdblock6
msm_reserve_memory: 0x44600000, 0x200000
memory pool 3 (start 5fc00000 size 400000) initialized
Memory policy: ECC disabled, Data cache writealloc
smem_find(137, 80): wrong size 72
socinfo_init: v6, id=280, ver=3.0, raw_id=17, raw_ver=17, hw_plat=0, hw_plat_ver=65536
accessory_chip=0 hw_plat_subtype=0
PERCPU: Embedded 8 pages/cpu @c0d53000 s10624 r8192 d13952 u32768
Built 1 zonelists in Zone order, mobility grouping on. Total pages: 123178
Kernel command line: console=ttyHSL1,115200n8 ubi.mtd=netgear root=/dev/mtdblock6
PID hash table entries: 2048 (order: 1, 8192 bytes)
Dentry cache hash table entries: 65536 (order: 6, 262144 bytes)
Inode-cache hash table entries: 32768 (order: 5, 131072 bytes)
Memory: 49MB 436MB = 485MB total
Memory: 482500k/488644k available, 14140k reserved, 0K highmem
Virtual kernel memory layout:
vector : 0xffff0000 - 0xffff1000 ( 4 kB)
fixmap : 0xfff00000 - 0xfffe0000 ( 896 kB)
vmalloc : 0xdf000000 - 0xff000000 ( 512 MB)
lowmem : 0xc0000000 - 0xdeb00000 ( 491 MB)
pkmap : 0xbfe00000 - 0xc0000000 ( 2 MB)
modules : 0xbf000000 - 0xbfe00000 ( 14 MB)
.text : 0xc0008000 - 0xc0631000 (6308 kB)
.init : 0xc0700000 - 0xc0802980 (1035 kB)
.data : 0xc0804000 - 0xc08a79a0 ( 655 kB)
.bss : 0xc08a79c4 - 0xc094f418 ( 671 kB)
SLUB: Genslabs=11, HWalign=64, Order=0-3, MinObjects=0, CPUs=2, Nodes=1
Hierarchical RCU implementation.
NR_IRQS:1689
sched_clock: 32 bits at 32kHz, resolution 31240ns, wraps every 134175798ms
Console: colour dummy device 80x30
Calibrating delay using timer specific routine.. 12.55 BogoMIPS (lpj=62787)
pid_max: default: 32768 minimum: 301
Mount-cache hash table entries: 512
CPU: Testing write buffer coherency: ok
CPU0: thread -1, cpu 0, socket 0, mpidr 80000000
Setting up static identity map for 0x4195f308 - 0x4195f390
CPU1: Booted secondary processor
CPU1: thread -1, cpu 1, socket 0, mpidr 80000001
Brought up 2 CPUs
SMP: Total of 2 processors activated (25.11 BogoMIPS).
dummy:
NET: Registered protocol family 16
AXI: msm_bus_fabric_init_driver(): msm_bus_fabric_init_driver
meminfo_init: smem ram ptable found: ver: 0 len: 5
Found 1 memory banks grouped into 8 memory regions
gpiochip_add: registered GPIOs 0 to 151 on device: msmgpio
smem_find(137, 80): wrong size 72
socinfo_init: v6, id=280, ver=3.0, raw_id=17, raw_ver=17, hw_plat=0, hw_plat_ver=65536
accessory_chip=0 hw_plat_subtype=0
msm_rpm_init: RPM firmware 3.0.16777364
clk_tbl_nss_fast - loaded
msm_dmov_memcpy_init: Success
sps:BAM 0x12244000 enabled: ver:0x5, number of pipes:20
sps:BAM 0x12244000 is registered.
sps:sps is ready.
msm_pcie_setup: link initialized
PCI host bridge to bus 0000:00
pci_bus 0000:00: root bus resource [mem 0x08000000-0x0fefffff]
PCI: bus0: Fast back to back transfers disabled
pci 0000:00:00.0: bridge configuration invalid ([bus 00-00]), reconfiguring
PCI: bus1: Fast back to back transfers disabled
msm_pcie_setup: link initialized
PCI host bridge to bus 0000:02
pci_bus 0000:02: root bus resource [mem 0x2e000000-0x31efffff]
PCI: bus2: Fast back to back transfers disabled
pci 0000:02:00.0: bridge configuration invalid ([bus 00-00]), reconfiguring
PCI: bus3: Fast back to back transfers disabled
msm_pcie_setup: link initialization failed
pci 0000:02:00.0: BAR 8: assigned [mem 0x2e000000-0x2e1fffff]
pci 0000:03:00.0: BAR 0: assigned [mem 0x2e000000-0x2e1fffff 64bit]
pci 0000:02:00.0: PCI bridge to [bus 03-03]
pci 0000:02:00.0: bridge window [mem 0x2e000000-0x2e1fffff]
PCI: enabling device 0000:02:00.0 (0140 -> 0143)
pci 0000:00:00.0: BAR 8: assigned [mem 0x08000000-0x081fffff]
pci 0000:01:00.0: BAR 0: assigned [mem 0x08000000-0x081fffff 64bit]
pci 0000:00:00.0: PCI bridge to [bus 01-01]
pci 0000:00:00.0: bridge window [mem 0x08000000-0x081fffff]
PCI: enabling device 0000:00:00.0 (0140 -> 0143)
bio: create slab <bio-0> at 0
SCSI subsystem initialized
spi_qsd spi_qsd.5: master is unqueued, this is deprecated
spi_qsd spi_qsd.6: master is unqueued, this is deprecated
usbcore: registered new interface driver usbfs
usbcore: registered new interface driver hub
usbcore: registered new device driver usb
Switching to clocksource gp_timer
NET: Registered protocol family 2
create ipmac proc
IP route cache hash table entries: 4096 (order: 2, 16384 bytes)
TCP established hash table entries: 16384 (order: 5, 131072 bytes)
TCP bind hash table entries: 16384 (order: 5, 131072 bytes)
TCP: Hash tables configured (established 16384 bind 16384)
TCP: reno registered
UDP hash table entries: 256 (order: 1, 8192 bytes)
UDP-Lite hash table entries: 256 (order: 1, 8192 bytes)
NET: Registered protocol family 1
smd: register irq failed on wcnss_a11
smd: deregistering IRQs
SMD: smd_core_platform_init() failed
Partition (from dni partition table) qcadata -- Offset:0 Size:64
Partition (from dni partition table) APPSBL -- Offset:64 Size:28
Partition (from dni partition table) APPSBLENV -- Offset:8c Size:4
Partition (from dni partition table) ART -- Offset:90 Size:a
Partition (from dni partition table) ART.bak -- Offset:9a Size:a
Partition (from dni partition table) kernel -- Offset:a4 Size:11
Partition (from dni partition table) rootfs -- Offset:b5 Size:ef
Partition (from dni partition table) netgear -- Offset:1a4 Size:224
Partition (from dni partition table) firmware -- Offset:a4 Size:100
Partition (from dni partition table) crashdump -- Offset:3c8 Size:4
Partition (from dni partition table) language -- Offset:3cc Size:1c
Partition (from dni partition table) config -- Offset:3e8 Size:9
Partition (from dni partition table) pot -- Offset:3f1 Size:9
smem_find(427, 88): wrong size 96
get_bootconfig_partition 0 0 : v2 magic not found
acpuclk-ipq806x acpuclk-ipq806x: SPEED BIN: 0
acpuclk-ipq806x acpuclk-ipq806x: ACPU PVS: 4
acpuclk-ipq806x acpuclk-ipq806x: CPU0: 6 frequencies supported
acpuclk-ipq806x acpuclk-ipq806x: CPU1: 6 frequencies supported
msm_rpm_log_probe: OK
squashfs: version 4.0 (2009/01/31) Phillip Lougher
msgmni has been set to 942
Asymmetric key parser 'x509' registered
io scheduler noop registered
io scheduler deadline registered (default)
Serial: 8250/16550 driver, 2 ports, IRQ sharing disabled
msm_serial_hs: probe of msm_serial_hs.0 failed with error -2
msm_serial_hs module loaded
msm_serial_hsl: detected port #1
msm_serial_hsl.1: ttyHSL1 at MMIO 0x16340000 (irq = 184) is a MSM
msm_serial_hsl: console setup on port #1
console [ttyHSL1] enabled
msm_serial_hsl: driver initialized
ahci ahci.0: forcing PORTS_IMPL to 0x1
ahci ahci.0: AHCI 0001.0300 32 slots 1 ports 6 Gbps 0x1 impl platform mode
ahci ahci.0: flags: ncq sntf pm led clo only pmp pio slum part ccc apst
scsi0 : ahci_platform
ata1: SATA max UDMA/133 mmio [mem 0x29000000-0x2900017f] port 0x100 irq 241
msm_nand_probe: phys addr 0x1ac00000
msm_nand_probe: dmac 0x3
msm_nand_probe: allocated dma buffer at ffdfc000, dma_addr 5f5a2000
status: 20
nandid: 1580a12c maker 2c device a1
ONFI probe : Found an ONFI compliant device MT29F1G08ABBEAH4 ,
Found a supported NAND device
NAND Controller ID : 0x4030
NAND Device ID : 0x1580a12c
Buswidth : 8 Bits
Density : 128 MByte
Pagesize : 2048 Bytes
Erasesize: 131072 Bytes
Oobsize : 64 Bytes
CFG0 Init : 0xa8d408c0
CFG1 Init : 0x0004745c
ECCBUFCFG : 0x00000203
Creating 13 MTD partitions on "msm_nand":
0x000000000000-0x000000c80000 : "qcadata"
0x000000c80000-0x000001180000 : "APPSBL"
0x000001180000-0x000001200000 : "APPSBLENV"
0x000001200000-0x000001340000 : "ART"
0x000001340000-0x000001480000 : "ART.bak"
0x000001480000-0x0000016a0000 : "kernel"
0x0000016a0000-0x000003480000 : "rootfs"
mtd: find squashfs magic at 0x16a0000 of "msm_nand"
the correct location of partition "rootfs": 0x0000016a0000-0x000003480000
0x000003480000-0x000007900000 : "netgear"
0x000001480000-0x000003480000 : "firmware"
0x000007900000-0x000007980000 : "crashdump"
0x000007980000-0x000007d00000 : "language"
ata1: SATA link down (SStatus 0 SControl 300)
0x000007d00000-0x000007e20000 : "config"
0x000007e20000-0x000007f40000 : "pot"
m25p80 spi5.0: found pm25lv512, expected s25fl512s
m25p80 spi5.0: pm25lv512 (64 Kbytes)
UBI: attaching mtd7 to ubi0
UBI: physical eraseblock size: 131072 bytes (128 KiB)
UBI: logical eraseblock size: 126976 bytes
UBI: smallest flash I/O unit: 2048
UBI: VID header offset: 2048 (aligned 2048)
UBI: data offset: 4096
UBI: max. sequence number: 262
UBI: attached mtd7 to ubi0
UBI: MTD device name: "netgear"
UBI: MTD device size: 68 MiB
UBI: number of good PEBs: 548
UBI: number of bad PEBs: 0
UBI: number of corrupted PEBs: 0
UBI: max. allowed volumes: 128
UBI: wear-leveling threshold: 4096
UBI: number of internal volumes: 1
UBI: number of user volumes: 6
UBI: available PEBs: 33
UBI: total number of reserved PEBs: 515
UBI: number of PEBs reserved for bad PEB handling: 5
UBI: max/mean erase counter: 2/1
UBI: image sequence number: 781084784
UBI: background thread "ubi_bgt0d" started, PID 666
GPIO Bitbanged MDIO: probed
tun: Universal TUN/TAP device driver, 1.6
tun: (C) 1999-2004 Max Krasnyansky <maxk@qualcomm.com>
usbcore: registered new interface driver cdc_ether
Initializing USB Mass Storage driver...
usbcore: registered new interface driver usb-storage
USB Mass Storage support registered.
usbcore: registered new interface driver libusual
i2c /dev entries driver
cpuidle: using governor ladder
cpuidle: using governor menu
Netfilter messages via NETLINK v0.30.
NAT Session Management application ports priority table is loaded!
nf_conntrack version 0.5.0 (7539 buckets, 30156 max)
ip_tables: (C) 2000-2006 Netfilter Core Team
TCP: cubic registered
TCP: westwood registered
TCP: highspeed registered
TCP: vegas registered
TCP: yeah registered
TCP: illinois registered
NET: Registered protocol family 10
ip6_tables: (C) 2000-2006 Netfilter Core Team
IPv6 over IPv4 tunneling driver
NET: Registered protocol family 17
Bridge firewalling registered
Ebtables v2.0 registered
8021q: 802.1Q VLAN Support v1.8
VFP support v0.3: implementor 51 architecture 64 part 4d variant 2 rev 0
Registering SWP/SWPB emulation handler
clock_late_init: Removing enables held for handed-off clocks
ipq_nss_get_mac_addr: MAC[0]: b0:7f:b9:xx:xx:xx
ipq_nss_get_mac_addr: MAC[1]: b0:7f:b9:xx:xx:xx
no pmic restart interrupt specified
VFS: Mounted root (squashfs filesystem) readonly on device 31:6.
Freeing init memory: 1032K
UBIFS: recovery needed
UBIFS: recovery completed
UBIFS: mounted UBI device 0, volume 5, name "overlay_volume"
UBIFS: file system size: 57266176 bytes (55924 KiB, 54 MiB, 451 LEBs)
UBIFS: journal size: 2920448 bytes (2852 KiB, 2 MiB, 23 LEBs)
UBIFS: media format: w4/r0 (latest is w4/r0)
UBIFS: default compressor: lzo
UBIFS: reserved for root: 2704822 bytes (2641 KiB)
UBIFS error (pid 1296): ubifs_read_node: bad node type (255 but expected 0)
UBIFS error (pid 1296): ubifs_read_node: bad node at LEB 11:6144, LEB mapping status 0
UBIFS error (pid 1296): ubifs_iget: failed to read inode 66, error -22
UBIFS error (pid 1296): ubifs_lookup: dead directory entry 'etc', error -22
UBIFS warning (pid 1296): ubifs_ro_mode: switched to read-only mode, error -22
Backtrace:
[<c0011f6c>] (dump_backtrace+0x0/0x118) from [<c04565f0>] (dump_stack+0x18/0x1c)
r6:00000004 r5:dd342000 r4:00000010 r3:c088118c
[<c04565d8>] (dump_stack+0x0/0x1c) from [<c01c1f30>] (ubifs_ro_mode.part.12+0x68/0x6c)
[<c01c1ec8>] (ubifs_ro_mode.part.12+0x0/0x6c) from [<c01c2040>] (ubifs_ro_mode+0x1c/0x20)
r6:ddf1e000 r5:ddc88000 r4:ddc91980 r3:00000000
[<c01c2024>] (ubifs_ro_mode+0x0/0x20) from [<c01bc8f4>] (ubifs_lookup+0x104/0x144)
[<c01bc7f0>] (ubifs_lookup+0x0/0x144) from [<c00e83c8>] (__lookup_hash+0xac/0xf0)
r8:ddc91300 r7:00000000 r6:dd343cd4 r5:ddc6eb80 r4:ddc91980
[<c00e831c>] (__lookup_hash+0x0/0xf0) from [<c00e933c>] (lookup_one_len+0x108/0x118)
r7:ddc6eb80 r6:00000000 r5:ddc91927 r4:00000636
[<c00e9234>] (lookup_one_len+0x0/0x118) from [<c01d7c80>] (ovl_lookup+0x74/0x3a0)
r8:ddc91300 r7:ddc6eb80 r6:dd3e4e80 r5:ddc91300 r4:ddc91900
[<c01d7c0c>] (ovl_lookup+0x0/0x3a0) from [<c00e83c8>] (__lookup_hash+0xac/0xf0)
r9:00000001 r8:ddc91300 r7:dd343e80 r6:dd343dc4 r5:ddc91300
r4:ddc91900
[<c00e831c>] (__lookup_hash+0x0/0xf0) from [<c00e9c34>] (do_lookup+0x288/0x2c0)
r7:00000000 r6:dd343dbc r5:dd343e80 r4:dd343db4
[<c00e99ac>] (do_lookup+0x0/0x2c0) from [<c00e9e44>] (link_path_walk+0x1d8/0x884)
[<c00e9c6c>] (link_path_walk+0x0/0x884) from [<c00ea62c>] (path_lookupat+0x5c/0x730)
[<c00ea5d0>] (path_lookupat+0x0/0x730) from [<c00ead24>] (do_path_lookup+0x24/0x60)
[<c00ead00>] (do_path_lookup+0x0/0x60) from [<c00ec1e0>] (user_path_at_empty+0x60/0x90)
r7:dd343f20 r6:dd343e80 r5:00000001 r4:dd561000
[<c00ec180>] (user_path_at_empty+0x0/0x90) from [<c00ec22c>] (user_path_at+0x1c/0x24)
r8:c000e6a4 r7:0000006a r6:40084f78 r5:dd343f40 r4:bea06af0
[<c00ec210>] (user_path_at+0x0/0x24) from [<c00e2134>] (vfs_fstatat+0x38/0x70)
[<c00e20fc>] (vfs_fstatat+0x0/0x70) from [<c00e268c>] (sys_newstat+0x28/0x44)
r5:bea06ce8 r4:bea06af0
[<c00e2664>] (sys_newstat+0x0/0x44) from [<c000e520>] (ret_fast_syscall+0x0/0x30)
r4:40084f78
UBIFS error (pid 1297): ubifs_read_node: bad node type (255 but expected 0)
UBIFS error (pid 1297): ubifs_read_node: bad node at LEB 11:6144, LEB mapping status 0
UBIFS error (pid 1297): ubifs_iget: failed to read inode 66, error -22
UBIFS error (pid 1297): ubifs_lookup: dead directory entry 'etc', error -22
UBIFS error (pid 1298): ubifs_read_node: bad node type (255 but expected 0)
UBIFS error (pid 1298): ubifs_read_node: bad node at LEB 11:6144, LEB mapping st
I already connect serial to router and use putty as a console.
I stop boot by pressing a pc key and stop the boot.
Now putty console show me (IPQ) # , and probably wait commands from me.
Could you tell me how to recover I mean what commands to type etc..?
Thank you,
Cristian
Sorry, but I have never needed to flash my R7800 via serial, so I don't dare to tell you any exact commands.
Based on the log above, you have a device with a working u-boot bootloader and that the device has the original Netgear OEM firmware (kernel 3.4). But that firmware seems somehow corrupted. Right? What is the Openwrt/LEDE angle?
But in any case, you should be able to flash a new firmware to the device by using the TFTP recovery mode. It is really simple.
- You need to download either a new Netgear OEM firmware or a "factory" version of Openwrt/LEDE firmware.
- Then follow the TFTP advice in message 5 of this thread.
https://forum.openwrt.org/t/netgear-r7800-exploration-ipq8065-qca9984/285/5
Hi!
I can flash dd-wrt or lede, voxel or stock doesn't work.
Thank you
Cristian
This is the solution for repairing router.
Code:
ubifs is corrupt and you need to clean this area:
0x000003480000-0x000007900000
Stop with ctrl-c at uboot prompt and enter this command:
nand erase 0x3480000 0x4480000
then run command:
fw_recovery
tftp netgear fw again e.g.:
tftp 192.168.1.1
binary
put netgear...chk
Solution was given by Kong, so thank you.
2 Likes
Someone made a new patch for kernel 4.14. According to posts on Lede-dev, it should work for the R7800.
https://patchwork.ozlabs.org/patch/911287/
Building now...
Remember that you need to extend the kernel partition and change the kernel version to 4.14 in the Makefile. I have a patch here to do that:
You need to TFTP-recover flash the image.
Thank you for the tip.
Question, if I increase the kernel partition, can I still easily switch back to stock?
I assume you're talking about stock NETGEAR firmware, and in that case I'm not entirely sure. I haven't tried to TFTP-recover from OpenWrt with an expanded kernel to stock. However, I don't think there should be any issues as long as you use TFTP-recovery. I've switched between OpenWrt images with different kernel partition sizes many times and never experienced any issues.
NOTE: I think everything should be fine as long as you don't mess with the NETGEAR partition.
There must be a reason why the default is 2M. Anyone know why?