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Short introduction to OpenWRT

OpenWRT is a Linux distribution which was create originally for the Linksys Router (therefore the name WRT). Nowadays it supports a wide range of the devices and is the best Solution if you want to run Linux completely from flash memory on embedded devices.

There have been several attempts to port OpenWRT to the IB4220 but all of them were discontinued because there was no support for a current kernel, just for the 2.6.15 kernel, which was delivered with the original firmware. But especially the kernel itself was the source of many problems, sepecially the network driver. So I spent a lot of time to create a new network driver for the current kernel, based on the work of some other contributors. I did a complete reverse engineering and was able to figure out the problem, which led in the 2.6.15 kernel to dropouts. As result we have now a complete functional stable kernel for the IB4220 Nas. The only thing which is lacking so far is support the crypto engine, performance for encrypted partions is limited. I also invested some time in the firmware upgrade utilities and as a result we are now able to upgrade the firmware without the need of a console cable.

As a result there is now a current version of OpenWRT available. For any further information on OpenWRT I recommend visiting their web site. Compared to most routers we have "plenty" of flash memory so I took the decision to use eglibc for better compatibility and performance.

As the OpenWRT team has its focus more on routers than on NAS I also created several new storage related packages like full blown Samba, tools for ACLs, raid monitoring etc.

What you can expect from this firmware

Nice web interface for most tasks
Stable system with current kernel, including support for NFS 4, EXT4 and XFS
Samba 4 with SMB2 support
Zeroconf using WSD and LLMNR
LDAP/Kerberos with web interface and single sign-on from Windows
Full ADS support with OpenLDAP and Kerberos
GUID partition support (Partions >2TB no problem)
Lots of additional packages like php, transmission, python ...
FTP performance 30MB/s read, 20MB/s write
Samba performance 19MB/s read, 8MB/s write

Limitations

This software is provided "as is" without express or implied warranty

Changelog

Download & Installation

Please download the corresponding image from the download section The image format is comaptible to the one of RS so you can just upgrade it as usual. On the other hand can also go back just by flashing the RS firmware at any time (although I cannot imagine any reason :-) ). Be patient as the upgrade can take up to 10 minutes.

DO NOT SWITCH OF YOUR DEVICE OR RESET IT DURING THE UPGRADE PROCESS.