Any plans to update to 18.06.02?
Is there and updated imagebuilder somewhere?
We have covered this in other threads. The B1300/S1300 routers are dependent on the Qualcomm build environment which is currently stuck on 15.05.1, nothing that GL can do at the moment about upgrading to a later OpenWRT version.
As soon as Qualcomm updates their build environment, GL will put up an update shortly after.
If you want you can build your own 18.06.2 following the OpenWRT build guides, but you will loose a lot of wifi performance since it won’t contain the Qualcomm closed source drivers.
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Ok, thanks for your answer.
That is QSDK? Is it like a copy of openwrt at a specific time (15.05.1 tag)?
I suppose that nobody will provide a compiled driver without sources to do not loose perfomance. Negative point for Qualcomm.
Yeah its the QSDK. They basically took 15.05.1, added their kernel modifications, various changes and placed their closed source optimized drivers.
The drivers are blobs and not compiled by GL at all, just used in the final firmware, dropped in.
Asus has had similar problems with Broadcom were they don’t even release kernel sources 
It’s mostly the WiFi drivers - QSDK has this sorted already - both for Wave1 and Wave2 - and the MESH stuff.
The ath10k drivers for IPQ40xx - still a bit under development, and Wave2 features are needed a lot of work - and no MESH.
Smart choice by the GL-iNet team to stick with QSDK for now…
Not that I disagree that Qualcomm’s proprietary drivers may not have advantages over the open-source options, but IPQ4019 under ath10k-ct supports mesh, including 802.11s.
valid interface combinations:
* #{ managed } <= 16, #{ AP, mesh point } <= 16, #{ IBSS } <= 1,
total <= 16, #channels <= 1, STA/AP BI must match, radar detect widths: { 20 MHz (no HT), 20 MHz, 40 MHz, 80 MHz }
mesh8 ESSID: "SoC"
Access Point: 30:23:03:xx:xx:xx
Mode: Mesh Point Channel: 36 (5.180 GHz)
Tx-Power: 23 dBm Link Quality: unknown/70
Now there are some other “challenges” with the open-source, Ethernet/switch support on the ipq40xx platform. Even DSA/qca8k isn’t even close to resolving these (even on Linux master at this time), including flexible handling of multiple MACs (the hardware kind) and handling of VLANs. The SoC works great for “home-router” use where one MAC handles “WAN” and the other handles “LAN”, but can be a challenge for advanced users with multiple VLANs.
That said, I’ve got three, IPQ4019-based, triple-radio devices here and would seriously consider the Convexa if I needed another router.
There’s some issues with the ethernet switch element, and I’m think it might intersect with the Wave2 and Mesh items for WiFi.
DSA is a thing unto its own, and many switch elements can have issues with this set of API’s and their own special sauce for flow offloading.
Keep in mind that DSA has deep roots into a specific vendor’s switch chip - Marvell Linkstreet…
Not make excuses for Qualcomm - just saying they do have their priorities with that chipset, and multiple VLAN’s (outside of the typical one that can be static in the build) is likely not the highest priority.
The MESH stuff is pretty useless on GL-B1300, in my opinion. The mesh is unreliable, doesn’t setup correctly or stay stable. So, loosing MESH support is fine, as it’s already not there in the product. (I’ve contacted gl-inet support and they seem to admit the mesh support in the convexa is pretty unreliable.)
Anyone know what are the performance trade-offs if a recent version of OpenWrt is loaded onto the product?
To be honest, I think this is actually a pretty big deal for the product. The advertising and sales pages for GL-B1300 boast it comes pre-loaded with Openwrt. But the advertising DOES NOT make it clear the device is STUCK on an old version (circa 2018) of Openwrt. Why would anyone want to buy a product that’s all about running Openwrt if the hardware drivers prevent it running a recent version of Openwrt? [I’m ignoring the clear mis-selling around MESH support as well.]
Yes, it might not be gl-inet’s fault that Qualcomm QSDK is only on openwrt v15, but when gl-inet market and sell the convex 1300 line they should be upfront and clear that the hardware is stuck on this old version, and that you will loose “will loose a lot of wifi performance since it won’t contain the Qualcomm closed source drivers” if you go to a recent version of openwrt.
Has anyone provided some clear information to customers just how much performance they can expect to loose if they drop the closed-source firmware drivers and go to a recent version of Openwrt?
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I don’t have a number but we do have client using latest openwrt on B1300. There is even prplMesh firmware available. Getting Started · Wiki · prpl Foundation / prplOS / prplos · GitLab
@alzhao thanks for the reply. Sorry, I don’t know what prplMesh/prplOS. I’ve had a look at the gitlab link but I don’t understand. Who are prplOS?
I don’t have a number but we do have client using latest openwrt on B1300.
Yeah, I do know people buy the B1300 and then flash the latest OpenWrt onto it. I tried doing that myself but kept getting stuck, thinking the flash had failed. But I think it’s just that when Openwrt is flashed onto the device, you need to connect over ethernet with ssh or something rather than trying to connect via Wifi.
However, before I flash my router so it runs OpenWrt 19, it would be really nice to know how much performance I’ll loose. I’m not sophisticated enough to be able to work out what performance measurements or metrics are good measures. So I can’t really even do the performance testing myself.
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Franky speaking I don’t have a number.