FREETZ TYPE 549X 7490

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BoxMatrix >> Development >> FREETZ TYPE 549X 7490

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Introduction

Some kind person of the IPPF forum donated a FRITZ!Box 5490, a fiber model. Looking at its Webinterface i directly saw the limited features in comparison to DSL models. Like many cable models the 5490 does not provide an IP-Client mode. There are onlyrouting modes, either with an external or the builtin fiber modem. Without an IP-Client mode there's also no full functionality of a Mesh-Repeater possible. Besides this the firmware is pretty left behind (7.12 only while the 7490 has 7.12 and frequent labors).

So why not write a freetz alien to adapt the 7490 firmware for the 5490. The 5491 just has a differung fiber port but all info here applies to it too.

Download

This alien will be checked into Freetz-ng, for those who can't wait or want to integrate it in another fork here the tested patch to download:

• FreetzType_549X_7490-0.1.patch - 2021-01-19 - vs. freetz-ng svn rev 17719

To test the alien do:

umask 0022
svn co -r 17719 http://svn.boxmatrix.info/freetz-ng/trunk 549x
cd 549x
wget https://boxmatrix.info/hosted/hippie2000/FreetzType_549X_7490-0.1.patch
svn patch FreetzType_549X_7490-0.1.patch
make menuconfug
make

Set user experience to Advanced, select the 7490 and Compile for alien hardware and then select your 549x model.

Comparison

Both models nearly have the same design, with these differences:

Switch-Chip

The 5490 uses a switch chip while the 7490 uses 2 PHY chips for the LAN. Fortunately the 7490 kernel supports this chip, but without special initialisation 2 ports remain dead. On 7.12 it works fine to copy E46-net from the 5490 firmware to have 4 ports. On 7.21 3 commands attached to the config (initscr) to activate the 2 ports and bring up eth2.2, eth3.3 and the so far unrelated vlan_master0 interface. Tested with 7.12 and 7.21.

ip link set up dev vlan_master0
ip link set up dev eth2.2
ip link set up dev eth3.3

TFFS-Partitions

The 5490 uses TFFS2 (2 partitions) while the 7490 uses TFFS3 (single partition nand-tffs). Fortunately the 7490 kernel TFFS3 driver detects that it can't initialise the nand-tffs and switches back to a TFFS2 legacy mode. It works fiine when replacing the tffs startup script S08-tffs with the script from the 5490 firmware (copied to tffs (initscr) on 7.21), otherwise the tffs gets damaged. Tested with 7.12 and 7.21.

Install-Script

Since the 7490 install script contains a lot of code for nand-tffs the 5490 install script has to be used. It just needs adaption if the firmware version is not 7.12. Tested with 7.12 and 7.21.

LED-Layout

Both models have a different LED layout:

• 5490: Power - Fiber - WLAN - Fon - Info
• 7490: Power/DSL - Tel. VoIP - Tel. PSTN - WLAN - Info

On 7.12 it helps to copy kernel.image from the 5490 firmware (if replace-kernel is switched off) to fix the layout, but the power LED does not stop blinking in IP-Client mode. Otherwise the LEDs will act like on a 7490, and the power LED stops blinking in IP-Client mode. This is just a cosmetic issue and must be patched in replace-kernel (TODO).

Firmware

The latest firmware available for *both* models is 7.12, so I made a Firmware-Diff of it:

• 5490-diff-712.txt

Internet

The 5490 has a fiber port while the 7490 has a DSL/ISDN/POTS port. Since both models use the same DSL chip the 5490 can pretend to be a DSL router without any problems. The IP-Client is a feature of a DSL router and works fine, with a full featured Mesh-Repeater mode. The FPGA does not need bitfile_isdn.bit and bitfile_pots.bit but works fine with the bitfile.bit and the S11-piglet script from the 5490 firmware. Tested with 7.12 and 7.21.

Fiber-Stack

TLDR - it's possible to start the 7.12 fiber stack on 7.21, however, this does not mean that it works.

The fiber stack consists of:

• The daemons avm2fiber_xdsld and fiber_monitor, which can run on 7.21 if no dsl_monitor is running
• The daemon eth_oam, also part of the 7490 firmware 7.21, but with incompatible options
• The kernel module avm_fiber_if.ko, AVM calls it a dummy fiber module, which they kindly ported to 7.21 in 7490 firmware
• The kernel module ltq_eth_oam_handler.ko, also part of 7490 firmware 7.21
• The library libfiberremotemgmt.so for ctlmgr, called by libcmapi.so, fails silently on 7.21
• The library libluafiber.so for the Webinterface, called by diagnosis.lua, fiber_fiber.lua, fiber_stats.lua, dsl_overview.lua, connection_info.lua and retrieve_data.lua, fails silently on 7.21
• The startup script E40-fiber and the shutdown script e40-fiber
• The diagnosis scripts supportdata.fiber and supportdata_argo.fiber
• A bunch of HTML files, see the firmware diff above.

Simplified E40-fiber starts the stack like this:

modprobe avm_fiber_if
fiber_monitor -d
avm2fiber_xdsld -d
modprobe ltq_eth_oam_handler ethwan=wan
ifconfig eoam up
eth_oam -ieoam -wwan -t0 -D

Simplified e40-fiber stops the stack like this:

killall eth_oam
ifconfig eoam down
modprobe -r ltq_eth_oam_handler
killall fiber_monitor
killall avm2fiber_xdsld

fiber_monitor is a modified dsl_monitor, and it will not run on 7.21 until dsl_monitor is killed, which even runs in IP-Client mode.
avm2fiber_xdsld runs fine on 7.21 but eth_oam lacks the -w option, so the eth_oam from the 5490 has to be used which runs fine.
Since 7.21 uses supervisor systemd replacement and does not start scripts in /etc/init.d automatically a service fiber.service is created from a modified dsl.service.

TLDR - it's possible to start the 7.12 fiber stack on 7.21, however, this does not mean that it works.

Feedback

For bug reports or feature requests please get in touch or use this forum thread (german or english language please):

• IPPF thread about this freetz type, requires an account to post

Known Bugs

• It seems that each Firmware update a new Webserver certificate is created, so you have to accept it as a new untrusted site. May be a TFFS issue.
• The page System >> Region and Language hangs when setting the language. After rebooting the box the selected language is used. May be a TFFS issue.
• The page Diagnostics >> Security does not list the name of the service running on each port. May be an I14N issue.
• Creating new telephone numbers fails, since there are no providers to choose from, not even "other". May be an I14N issue.
  • VoIP-Providers are handled by ctlmgr via libfon.so which also handles extraction of ie voip_providers-049.tar.
  • ctlmgr_ctl u voip_providerlist correctly lists all contained providers.
• Same applies to internet providers, there is just a selection between other and mobile on the Account Information page. May be an I14N issue.