OpenWrt

In my previous post, I mentioned that have a remote portal machine in my friend’s house where I use RustDesk to access into. However, in some use case, like access LAN resources and managing online services across multiple devices, the best practice is not using a remote desktop tool but having a VPN tunnel. Old Stories In the very early days, I used to use Hamachi to play LAN games like Counter Strike, Warcraft 3 and Minecraft with my internet friends. After I started doing homelab, I have used ZeroTier for quite a while before Tailscale came out. ...

Two month after flashing the Flint 2 GL-MT6000, I got its little brother GL-MT3000 in my hands as a powerful mini travel router runs stable build of OpenWrt. There are a few comparable routers in the same market, such as its older model GL-MT1300 v1 which is not very appealing price-wise; Cudy TR3000 v1 which is a direct competitor by its naming but has confusing variations that is not well supported by OpenWrt; and yet another older model Cudy TR1200 which is not available in the US. ...

It has been a while since my WiFi is getting more and more unstable, and I finally decided to retire my NETGEAR R6300v2 which has served me well since in 2017. It was in used condition when I bought it, so this is a good time to get a “new” router. Because the ISPs in my area are very bad, I still have to stick with the low speed Internet for probably quite some time. So I decided to buy a used Linksys MR7350. ...

During the prime day, my friend grabbed a GL.iNet Flint 2 (GL-MT6000) for a fair price, thanks to the slickdeals community. The specs of this model feels like a beast to me, because I don’t have enough high-end devices and Internet plan to utilize that much of performance. But what I can do is to boost its security and stability for my friend. Note: For operational security, all initial settings should be done without physical Internet/WAN connection. ...

Recently I came down to want a mobile hotspot when going out of home, something like Netgear Nighthawk M series, but able to flash custom firmware (OpenWrt/pfSense equivalents) and cheap. However, there is no such thing on the market even without budget consideration. So it has to be done with DIY, like USB tethering with a router. In the case of tethering or so called Ethernet over USB, we are using a phone as a cellular modem for our router. ...