Van Tech Corner ： OpenWRT – Install OpenWRT 21.02 on Ubiquiti EdgeRouter X

In this video, I am going to install OpenWRT 21.02 on the Ubiquiti EdgeRouter X (ER-X).

There are different ways to install OpenWRT: using TFTP with Reset button, TFTP with Serial Console and non-invasive method with Web-UI & SSH. Since the video is for beginner, I will go with the simplest way: Web-UI & SSH.

It a long video, but the procedure is very simple. First, you need to to flash the OpenWRT 19 initramfs on the Web-UI of EdgeOS (EdgeRouterX). At the time of making the video, my ER-X is running latest EdgeOS v2.0.9-hotfix.2. After that, connect the router via SSH (running OpenWRT), transfer OpenWRT 21 firmware with scp/WinSCP and run sysupgrade command to permanently flash OpenWRT on the device. You can’t do this with OpenWRT LuCI since the OpenWRT initramfs 19 is a snapshot version.

At the end of video, as usual, there will be initial OpenWRT setup, hardware & software offloading test with PPPoE.

Video timeframe:

00:00 – Intro
01:53 – Download OpenWRT 19 initramfs for EdgeOS
03:42 – Flash the OpenWRT 19 initramfs with EdgeRouterX Web-UI
06:00 – Unable to connect to EdgeRouter – Troubleshooting
08:29 – Power EdgeRouterX with DC Adapter solves the problem
09:44 – Transfer & Flash OpenWRT 21.02 on EdgeRouter X
13:51 – Initial Setup
14:51 – Configure PPPoE with VLAN
18:24 – PPPoE Speedtest & CPU Usage
20:25 – Hardware + Software Offloading PPPoE Speedtest
21:32 – Moving On

OpenWRT Firmware for Ubiquiti EdgeRouter – https://openwrt.org/toh/ubiquiti/edgerouter_x_er-x_ka
Thanks for watching and good luck!

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