How to disable LEDs

alzhao · 2017-05-15T14:23:42.000Z

in Luci->system->LED Configuration page

There is a button with text “Delete”, click it, then in the next page showed to you, click “Save & Apply”

This only disable wifi LED but not Power LED. To disable power led, use the method from @venet

Otherwise, use tape is easiest.

tipo0011 · 2017-05-15T14:44:46.000Z

Which parameter do I have to use? I’ve found only :wan, :wlan, :lan, and :powerusb (which is for the power of usb pen drive, not the router).

None of them can disable the power led of the router.

alzhao · 2017-05-15T14:47:15.000Z

@tipo0011, maybe the power LED is hardcored in hardware.

nopro404 · 2018-01-08T21:23:24.000Z

This works on my ar300m (including turning off the power led) but it should work on any of them:

find /sys/devices/platform/leds-gpio/leds/ ! -path ‘usbpow’ -name brightness -exec sh -c ‘echo 0 > {}’ ;

to turn them back on (except for power) I use:

/etc/init.d/led start

If you want to turn the power led back on change 0 to 255 in the first find command above.

I put these in cron to turn them off at night and back on during the day.

nopro404 · 2018-03-16T23:52:04.657Z

Just wanted to add my exact lines in my crontab - you can add these to yours in the advanced setting to automatically turn off the LED’s and turn them back on in the morning.

# LEDs off
*/5 15-23 * * * find /sys/devices/platform/leds-gpio/leds \! -path '*usbpow*' -name brightness -exec sh -c 'echo 0 > {}' \;
# LEDs on
0 0 * * * find /sys/devices/platform/leds-gpio/leds \! -path '*usbpow*' -name brightness -exec sh -c 'echo 255 > {}' \; && /etc/init.d/led start

It runs the LED off job every 5 minutes. This is so in case the router reboots it will turn the lights off again, but still give you enough time to make sure everything is connecting right by looking at the LED’s before turning them off again automatically.

The hour is the 2nd number on each uncommented line (no # in front). In my example 15-23 would be 3pm-11pm. My router runs in GMT timezone. Adjust these hours to your needs.

It then turns them back on at midnight (again in GMT).

nopro404 · 2018-06-30T23:56:03.687Z

updated for LEDE firmware:

# leds off
*/5 21-23,0-5 * * * find /sys/devices/platform/leds-gpio/leds \! -path '*usb*' -name brightness -exec sh -c 'echo 0 > {}' \;
# leds on
*/5 6-20 * * * find /sys/devices/platform/leds-gpio/leds \! -path '*usb*' -name brightness -exec sh -c 'echo 255 > {}' \; &&  /etc/init.d/led start

StevenBrown · 2019-01-10T09:55:43.334Z

Thanks guys I didn’t know how can I disable the LEDs its really useful thread for me.

nopro404 · 2019-01-10T20:12:14.412Z

StevenBrown:

Thanks guys I didn’t know how can I disable the LEDs its really useful thread for me.

Glad you like it. Wish the lights did anything useful at all in the V3 firmware though!

frameslip · 2021-04-29T13:26:22.676Z

This no longer works in 3.2. Any updates?

alzhao · 2021-04-30T09:15:07.775Z

It should still work. But you should check the LED file path to make sure they are correct.

frameslip · 2021-04-30T11:46:32.510Z

I had changed the file path to reflect the new file structure. The lights turn off, but when turn back on they are solid not blinking. A restart of /etc/init.d/led start has no effect.

alzhao · 2021-04-30T12:55:25.140Z

You can change settings in luci or directly in /etc/config/system

Blinking generally means data. You can change that to link. If you change in luci it is quite obvious

frameslip · 2021-04-30T14:50:46.808Z

The above commands allow a cron job to turn the lights on and off by schedule. Before when executing the commands the lights would return to normal operation with */5 6-20 * * * find /sys/devices/platform/leds-gpio/leds ! -path ‘usb’ -name brightness -exec sh -c ‘echo 255 > {}’ ; && /etc/init.d/led start. Now the light return to just solid with no blinking for data activity.

Can’t see how anything in /etc/config/system will resolve that. Please provide an example on how to turn the LEDs on and off via cron like in the previous firmware

ICAKaBLO · 2021-05-01T16:43:40.666Z

@frameslip which product/model do you have exactly?

alzhao:

Web interface → More → Advanced Settings → LuCI → (menu) System → LED → (button) Delete: This only disable Wi-Fi LED but not Power LED.

Interesting. Works here for all LEDs with a GL.iNet White (AR-150 with firmware 3.201-release). However, I did not delete the existing action but instead created a new action for each LED. As trigger, I selected ‘none’ and kept the ‘default state’ unchecked = off. Consequently, I succeeded solely with the help of LuCI; I did not need the command-line interface at all.

@GL.iNet this is a favorite request. Why not adding a ‘LED timeout after five minutes’ or ‘LED off after fully started’ checkbox to your own Web interface? Many—all?—other manufactures have this option, some for more than a decade. Some even offer both options and allow to configure the timeout.

@GL.iNet the default action has a trigger on ‘phy0tpt’ but it’s LED is named ‘orange:wlan’. This is a bit confusing because what is this ‘orange’? I was not even able to create the very same action if I accidentally deleted it. Is that ‘orange’ intended and correct?

frameslip · 2021-05-01T17:01:07.528Z

It is an AR750S. It is set up as a cron job so that lights are turned off at night then turned on at day automatically without manually using the web interface. This worked on the 3.1 firmware.

alzhao · 2021-05-03T09:20:09.118Z

ICAKaBLO:

@GL.iNet this is a favorite request. Why not adding a ‘LED timeout after five minutes’ or ‘LED off after fully started’ checkbox to your own Web interface? Many—all?—other manufactures have this option, some for more than a decade. Some even offer both options and allow to configure the timeout.

In some recent models you can turn the LED off via smartphone app. Better not to use some automated settings. It is quite easy to be confused if the router is actually working or not.

alzhao · 2021-05-03T09:26:28.469Z

You need to change as the path changed.

# leds off
*/5 21-23,0-5 * * * find /sys/devices/platform/leds/leds \! -path '*usb*' -name brightness -exec sh -c 'echo 0 > {}' \;
# leds on
*/5 6-20 * * * find /sys/devices/platform/leds/leds \! -path '*usb*' -name brightness -exec sh -c 'echo 255 > {}' \; &&  /etc/init.d/led start

frameslip · 2021-05-03T11:07:53.592Z

As I said in my previous post, I tried that:
Text from above:

“I had changed the file path to reflect the new file structure. The lights turn off, but when turn back on they are solid not blinking. A restart of /etc/init.d/led start has no effect.”

The lights never resume their normal functionality, just come back on solid. System needs to be rebooted to restore functionality

frameslip · 2021-05-03T11:10:12.710Z

These commands worked with 3.1

ICAKaBLO · 2021-05-10T15:25:17.587Z

alzhao:

In some recent models you can turn the LED off via smartphone app.

Which ones exactly?

alzhao:

In some recent models you can turn the LED off via smartphone app.

Why was that added?

alzhao:

Better not to use some automated settings. It is quite easy to be confused if the router is actually working or not.

That is the reason other manufacturers wait until everything is started and then apply a timeout for the LEDs. Because users are used to power-cycle a device in case something is wrong, there is not even a problem seeing that it does not work. However, in case of known failure, the LEDs lid of course. Did you create a feature request internally?