Could Asuswrt Merlin support wireless client mode?

[eric wong]

Hi, I'm new to SNB.
Operation Modes in Asuswrt Merlin are wireless router, bridge, ap, media bridge. But there is no wireless client mode, Could it be added?
In my case, I have a EPON router provide by ISP on floor 1 and AC68U on floor 2, I want to use AC68U connect to EPON router as wireless client via 2.4G, and act as wireless router via 5G. Have to set my cellphones and laptops under AC68U NAT, because my ISP has a limit of 4 clients under EPON router, I have more than 4 wireless devices.
Thank you so much.

 

[Nullity]

I doubt that the GUI is capable. The firmware includes wpa_supplicant though, so acting as a client should be very possible, but you would need to do most configuring via SSH/telnet.

 

[eric wong]

I doubt that the GUI is capable. The firmware includes wpa_supplicant though, so acting as a client should be very possible, but you would need to do most configuring via SSH/telnet.

Thank you for your reply. But which variable should I configure? In Openwrt it is in a config file, is Asuswrt-merlin aslo in a config file? or in nvram just like DD-WRT or Tomato.
Sorry for my poor English. If you can list the file or variables which I should config, It would be very nice.

 

[Nullity]

I do not know. I doubt that your goal can be accomplished by nvram vars alone.

My only experience is with using wpa_supplicant on my desktop-PC to connect to my AP as a client. (Something like "wpa_supplicant -i wlan0 -D nl80211,wext -c /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf". The documentation for wpa_supplicant is good, in the form of a stock .conf file explaining almost every option (100+).

 

[kvic]

I had similar thought a few years ago but never start to put to work due to lack of real usage. Based on you guys discussion I would think it's doable by roughly three main steps:

1. Use wpa_supplicant to connect AC68U to EPON router over 2.4GHz. Receive an IP address from EPON. The IP will be assigned to this 2.4GHz interface.
2. All interfaces (2.4/5/LAN ports) are part of a common "bridge", br0 in AC68U. So I think u need to take 2.4GHz out of this bridge. The command ebtables could do the work.
3. AC68 will act as a router on 5GHz/LAN ports. Use the 2.4Ghz interface as the default gateway. So you'll have to mangle the routing table a bit to reflect that.

All these can be done through a few scripts. asuswrt-merlin has custom script hooks in place (read the documentation). Once tested to work. All steps could be automated on boot.

I don't think it's necessary to deal with nvram for it to work. Once your solution starts to shape up. Nvram may help to polish up your work and make it convenient for other interested users.

Sounds like an interesting project

https://wiki.netbsd.org/tutorials/how_to_use_wpa_supplicant/