FreshTomato MIPS

Alternative open-source firmware for Broadcom MIPS-based routers.

Supported routers

FreshTomato MIPS supports both MIPSR1 and MIPSR2 devices.

Manufacturer	Models
ASUS	WL500GP, N10U, N12 A1/B1/C1/D1/VP/K/HP, N15U, N16, N53, N66U, AC66U
Netgear	WNR3500Lv1, WNR3500Lv2, R6300v1, WNDR4500v1, WNDR4500v2, WNDR3400/v2/v3, WNDR3700v3, WNDR4000
Linksys	WRT54 series, E800, E900, E1000v2/v2.1, E1200v1, E1200v2, E1500, E2000, E2500, E3000, E3200, E4200
Tenda	W1800R, N80
D-Link	DIR-320, DIR-865L
Belkin	F5D8235v3, F7D3301, F7D3302, F7D4302, F9K1102v1/v3

Caution

Flashing alternative firmware can permanently damage your router. The author is not responsible for bricked devices. Proceed entirely at your own risk.

Project resources

Resource	Link
Project website	freshtomato.org
Source code	GitHub · GitLab mirror
Changelog	CHANGELOG
Downloads	Download images
Issue tracker	GitHub Issues
Pull requests	GitHub Pull Requests
English forum	LinksysInfo
Polish forum	OpenLinksys
Donations	Support FreshTomato

Preparing the build environment

The following instructions target Debian 13 (64-bit).

1. Install Debian

Install Debian using the graphical installer. For simplicity:

• enable the SSH server;
• create a standard user account;
• keep the remaining options at their defaults.

In the commands below, replace <username>, <name>, and <email-address> with your own values.

2. Update the system

Log in as root, then run:

apt-get update
apt-get dist-upgrade

3. Install basic packages

apt-get install build-essential net-tools

4. Configure the time zone

dpkg-reconfigure tzdata

If the command is unavailable because of the current PATH, run:

export PATH="$PATH:/usr/sbin"

5. Grant sudo access

apt-get install sudo
adduser <username> sudo
reboot

After the reboot, log in as <username>.

6. Install build dependencies

sudo apt-get install \
  autoconf autoconf-archive m4 bison flex g++ libtool gcc binutils patch \
  bzip2 make gettext unzip zlib1g-dev libc6 gperf automake groff minisign

sudo apt-get install \
  lib32stdc++6 libncurses6 libncurses-dev gawk gitk zlib1g-dev autopoint \
  shtool autogen mtd-utils gcc-multilib lib32z1-dev pkg-config libssl-dev \
  automake

sudo apt-get install \
  libmnl-dev libxml2-dev intltool libglib2.0-dev texinfo dos2unix xsltproc \
  libnfnetlink0 libcurl4-openssl-dev libgtk2.0-dev libnotify-dev \
  libevent-dev git

sudo apt-get install \
  re2c texlive libelf1 nodejs zip mc cmake ninja-build curl \
  libglib2.0-dev-bin libglib2.0-dev sqlite3 dconf-editor python3-dev \
  python3-setuptools

sudo apt-get install "linux-headers-$(uname -r)"

7. Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/FreshTomato-Project/freshtomato-mips.git

8. Reboot

sudo reboot

9. Configure Git

cd freshtomato-mips
git config --global user.email "<email-address>"
git config --global user.name "<name>"

Compiling FreshTomato

Prepare the repository

Enter the repository:

cd freshtomato-mips

Before each compilation, clean and reset the working tree:

git clean -fdxq
git reset --hard

Optionally, download the latest changes:

git pull

Warning

git clean -fdxq and git reset --hard permanently remove untracked files and local changes.

RT image

Example: build a Mini image for a WRT54G-class device.

git checkout mips-master
cd release/src-rt
make help
make f

RT-N image

Example: build an AIO image for RT-N66U.

git checkout mips-RT-AC
cd release/src-rt
make help
make r64z

RT-AC image

Example: build an AIO image for RT-AC66U.

git checkout mips-RT-AC
cd release/src-rt-6.x
make help
make ac66z

make help lists the build targets available in the selected source tree.