Router won't boot - power led only is on

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What steps will reproduce the problem?
1. holding reset then plugging router into wall
2. holding reset while router is already on for 30 seconds
3. unplugging and plugging router back in

What is the expected output? What do you see instead?

Expect to see all lights come on and only the power led comes on, can't connect 
to router at all. Can't run firmware restoration. Router is not in rescue mode 
(where the power led blinks).

What version of the product are you using? On what operating system?

Just downloaded it two days ago so whatever the newest version is.

Please provide any additional information below.

After I installed your firmware, it did work for about an hour. I installed 
this because every firmware Asus provides has resulted in the same issue where 
I lose internet connectivity and the router becomes unresponsive. I am on my 
third router from Asus RMA and and only starting this issue to find out if I 
can un-brick the router. Otherwise it is just going to get recycled someday.

Original issue reported on code.google.com by micahman...@gmail.com on 15 Jan 2012 at 7:38

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I think some force-major event happened during update process. (maybe router 
was power offed or smth. like that).

You need to use asus firmware-restoration utility.

1. Unplug all lan cables from router accept one - with the machine you'll use 
to restore it.
2. Unplug the power-supply of router, hold the reset button and plug 
power-supply back.
3. Hold off the reset button when power led will start flashing. 

Please, let us know about the result. 10x! )

Original comment by d...@soulblader.com on 15 Jan 2012 at 8:59

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The router will not go into restoration mode. I've been trying for the last 16 
hours using the process you just described and which can also be found in the 
manual. I always get the same result, the power led comes on and nothing else 
happens. 

It was working fine, but this cycle started when I decided to move the power 
plug from one location to another. From the time I plugged it into the new 
location it has been essentially dead with the symptoms I wrote above. I tried 
moving the plug back to where it was in case there was some issue with the 
electrical outlet itself but this made no difference.

If I could just get it to restoration mode I'm sure everything would be fine 
from there. It really sounds like the router is quite dead. I appreciate your 
help.

Original comment by micahman...@gmail.com on 15 Jan 2012 at 9:09

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You should hold the reset button before you plug the power-supply and hold it 
until the light start flashing. If device is 'alive', it should start 
bootloader, which doesn't depend on firmware.
Please, read the instruction on CD (with router). I had spent several hours 
once too, because I did smth wrong.
I hope yours will come to live and will work for years! ))

Original comment by d...@soulblader.com on 15 Jan 2012 at 10:01

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That's what I've been doing, sorry if I didn't explain it well. I hold the 
reset button, then plug in the power. I've tried it a million times but nothing 
works. I did read the manual and made sure to follow it exactly. 

I've been posting around various networking forums about it, so maybe someone 
will know a trick for getting it back into restoration mode even with these 
seemingly bad circumstances. I'll be honest, at this point I don't know if I 
care whether it lives or dies. I've had three successively faulty units and I'm 
just ready to move on to another brand and a new router. Really appreciate your 
work and your help, keep it up. I'll let you know if I ever get it to work 
again :)

Original comment by micahman...@gmail.com on 16 Jan 2012 at 12:57

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Hello,

We loaded RT-N56U_1.0.1.7f-p7, and this firmware has been working fine for the 
last 4 days. Without warning tonight, I had the same symptoms. Since the 
upgrade we have not touched it (as it was working...)

The RT-N56U sits there with just the power led on.. 
Did the recovery procedure a few times.. All with the same result.. Tried 
recovery with the latest ASUS firmware RT-N56U_1.0.1.8b.trx and the recovery 
utility says upgrade successful and wait for reboot.. We waited and just the 
power LED is on..

Any help would be appreciated.

Cheers & Thanks
Dave.

Original comment by DaveKell...@gmail.com on 19 Jan 2012 at 10:21

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I put mine in for RMA. We'll see how it goes. I don't know if Asus cares 
whether or not this firmware is what is currently installed. I guess we'll find 
out once Asus receives my RMA.

Dave, I couldn't even do the recovery so at least that's a good thing I hope, 
but if it doesn't yield results I guess it's a moot point. Sorry to hear this 
happened to you too.

-Micah

Original comment by micahman...@gmail.com on 19 Jan 2012 at 10:14

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Yeah mine does all the right things for the recovery, except when it reboots 
it's still dead.. I'm thinking that it's a dry joint or some other hardware 
issue, and not this awsome firmware.. As i've now got this firmware running on 
4 ASUS routers and it runs like a rock.

Cheers & Thanks
Dave.

Original comment by DaveKell...@gmail.com on 20 Jan 2012 at 8:09

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Mhh recovery works great for me over lan and also with this nice Firmware from 
Padavan. All recovers nice.

Original comment by chriscomit.CL@googlemail.com on 20 Jan 2012 at 11:04

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This just happened to me: "Yeah mine does all the right things for the 
recovery" and I was still unable to recover. 
I am running the Asus recovery utility on Win 7 x64 as admin.
Then I thought wait a minute I am using static IP and not DHCP maybe that is 
it. Changed to DHCP still no luck.
Then I watched the Ethernet traffic with Wireshark and I noticed I am getting 
packets from 172.17.143.49 so I manually set my IP to be from the same network 
e.g. 172.17.143.11(netmask 255.255.255.0).
This time the Asus utility detected the router and started the update process 
and I was able to get my router back.

I suspect there is a bug in the Asus recovery utility and it's not setting the 
correct IP for some reason.

Hope this helps,
Cristian

Original comment by constant...@gmail.com on 10 Feb 2012 at 10:03

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I have similar problems, the router wont boot up, only the power lamp is ON. 
the recovery mode is not coming up as well.
wa anyone able to solve this problem? please help...

Original comment by madhavan...@gmail.com on 15 Jun 2012 at 8:16

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Hey man,

I just had to send mine in. They replaced it, and ever since I have just left 
it in the box, never likely to be used again. I bought a WNDR3800 instead and 
that one hasn't died yet (fingers crossed). 

Original comment by micahman...@gmail.com on 15 Jun 2012 at 3:41

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Power led should flash, then router is in the recovery mode. Make sure you'd 
pressed reset button before switching the power supply. If so everything should 
work. Make sure your machine has static ip address - 192.168.1.2 and gateway 
192.168.1.1, then try ASUS restoration utility. I did it many times and never 
had any problems.
PS: one more thing - disconnect all other lan cables (and WAN too).

Original comment by d...@soulblader.com on 16 Jun 2012 at 10:26

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tried everything possible, refuses to get into recovery mode. will be sending 
it to RMA, lets see what they have to say.
thanx everyone for your inputs.

Original comment by madhavan...@gmail.com on 17 Jun 2012 at 5:48

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HEY I FOUND OUT HOW TO FIX THIS ON YOUR OWN! MIGHT BE TOOO LATE THO! lmao, You 
can download the N16 utility program from ASUS support site, and also a N56U 
firmware, and once u install the utility, open the "firmware restoration" and 
follow the instructions! IT WORKED!!!!!!!

Original comment by brown.br...@insightbb.com on 6 Aug 2012 at 4:17

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DAAAANG. Too little to late for me, mine came back shiny and new from RMA and I 
promptly stowed it away, never even removing it from the box. Glad there is a 
fix though!

Original comment by micahman...@gmail.com on 6 Aug 2012 at 4:58

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Yeah, im surprised it worked, considering the utility is for the N16 router. 
But yeah hopefully someone can get theres working before sending it to RMA 

Original comment by brown.br...@insightbb.com on 6 Aug 2012 at 5:30

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Comment 10:  this absolutely worked for me when nothing else would.  Set the 
local IP address as you did (172.17.143.11) and used the ASUS firmware restore 
utility to restore a standard ASUS firmware.  It must go away from 192.168.1.1 
if you try hard enough to brick it. :)

Thank you so much.

Original comment by milobl...@gmail.com on 20 Sep 2012 at 5:20

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This just happened to me. I'm not sure whether it was this firmware that did it 
or a hardware problem. I'm going to exchange the device.

The version I was using was whichever one was latest on September 23, 2012.

I used the firmware recovery utility to try to restore the official ASUS 
firmware and the latest version of the custom firmware. Both ended in the 
utility saying "please wait for the wireless device to reboot" but it never 
does - it just sits there with the power light on.

Original comment by firexw...@gmail.com on 11 Oct 2012 at 9:58

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Hi!

I solved the following problem:
*My router had the original firmware FW_RT_N56U_3004342.trx
*Router didn't boot, only the power led was lit
*Only the WAN port had power, the LAN ports only had power in recovery mode
*I could put it into recovery mode. I tried all possible firmware restorations 
with original firmwares and RT-N16 utility too, no luck

My problem was solved by this site's custom micro firmware with restoration 
tool. It made sg the orig firmware restoration didn't. Now I restored the 
original firmware by the Web GUI, it works like a charm :)

Note: My router bricked itself when I committed something into nvram :P Never 
do it, if you're not exactly sure what you're doing! :)

Thanks for the custom firmware, it saved my Asus! :)

Original comment by cono...@gmail.com on 29 Mar 2013 at 10:42

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I've followed pretty much every guide to putting the RT-N65U into 
rescue/recovery mode.  Nothing works -- steady blue light, regardless.  Any one 
have any luck?  Note -- the issue here is the device not entering rescue mode.

Original comment by john.ste...@gmail.com on 13 Apr 2013 at 11:03

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i have the same problem here with my D-Link DI-604, the power led is on but the 
wan and 1, 2, 3, 4 are blinking it said to my server that the cable is unplug i 
checked all the cable and they were all good and hooked properly. pls 
help??????????

Original comment by bagnialb...@yahoo.com on 29 Apr 2013 at 12:21

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Have you tried unplugging the ethernet, one at a time? I found that my Blueray 
player would occasionally hang and cause all the hardwire connections to drop. 
As soon as I unplugged the ethernet cable from the Blueray player my connection 
would come back up. As soon as I plugged it back in all hardwire connections 
would drop. Now I just unplug the power to the Blueray player whenever it hangs 
to correct the issue.

Original comment by colsande...@gmail.com on 29 Apr 2013 at 4:00

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I tried following all of the suggestions posted above but still couldn't get 
the firmware restoration utility to recognize that the router was in recovery  
mode. Finally after some digging around, I stumbled upon this website: 
http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Static_IP and set my DNS to 208.67.222.222 
and 208.67.220.220 and it worked. Of course you would still have to set the 
static IP to .2 and the subnet mask to 255.255.255.0. I hope this helps someone 
else as well. My router is the RT-N53.

Original comment by Ta.Viv...@gmail.com on 1 Mar 2014 at 9:43

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Hi guys, after like 3 hours of trying hard i finally did it, this is how:

1. The ip of the computer used for the revival needs to be set to 192.168.1.2
2. Unplug all cables from the router even the power cord
3. Hold the reset power down while pluging the power cord
4. Hold the reset button until the power led starts flashing
5. Release the reset button
6. Plug the network cable into the computer and into the slot marked with the 
number 3 on the router.
7. Use the firmware restoration software provided by asus and load the stock 
firmware.

This worked for me. Hope it will help.

Original comment by alexandr...@gmail.com on 10 Apr 2014 at 9:08

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@alexandr....
I've tried doing what you've said. How long do you have to wait (with the reset 
button pressed) until the Blue LED starts to flash. 

I've held it down for a long time, and also inserted the power cord while the 
button is pressed.
It simply won't go into recovery mode.

Any one manage to recover after this?

Original comment by rishi.ga...@gmail.com on 19 May 2014 at 8:42

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Post #10 just saved my bacon when nothing else would.

Original comment by kheadi...@gmail.com on 26 May 2014 at 7:28

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Bought an RT-N56U yesterday to replace a NetComm NF5, all the reviews reckon it 
one of the better routers for the cash.  It looks good (bonus) and set up 
remarkably easy and right at the end  of the set up it asks "would you like to 
upgrade the firmware?"
I said yes, it went through a 3 minute download and install saying that it 
still had the original configuration saved then it said "manually reboot the 
router to complete the setup".
I switched it off, counted to 10 and switched it back on again only to be 
greeted with a flashing power light and nothing else.
This is supposed to be its 'recovery mode' but I can't contact the router by 
any means at all, WiFi, cable...  nothing works and the ASUS Firmware 
Restoration doesn't see it at all neither does the ASUS Device Discovery see 
it.  All I can say is Flashing power light on this router is NOT recovery mode. 
 Reset button does nothing.  I have tried every "this works" solution on the 
web and nothing works.  Opened a ticket with ASUS Technical people and the 
first line support (screen readers) came up with nothing.  It has been 
escalated to the second line (the elders of the temple) who were supposed to 
ring me back within 2 hours, that was 7+ hours ago and when I rang them after 4 
hours all I was told was that it had been passed on to the Temple Elders and 
just to wait for a call, While I was on I had to jump through hoops I jumped 
through before, plug it in, press reset for 10 seconds, press WAN button switch 
it on and off etc, etc, giving exactly the same results for this "screen 
reader", who it must be said, had the notes from the first call in front of him 
so why do it all again was mystery and a total waste of time.
Any one got any ideas o how to fix this, i'd be very grateful, and yes I have 
tried all the Cut & Pasted remedies that don't work that are pasted on 
virtually every forum without ever being substantiated.  
Sorry if this all sounds a bit cynical but I've spent all day on this problem 
being directed to one nonworking "sure fire" solution after another and have 
now gone back to using my old NetComm...  at least that one works.   

Original comment by Yellow.W...@googlemail.com on 4 Sep 2014 at 6:51

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@Yellow

Just had the same issue as you last night. Did you ever get yours working?

Can't believe how annoying this router is.

Original comment by nick.j.s...@gmail.com on 19 Sep 2014 at 7:03

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Bring a router one hour ago. Come up nice then went to update firmware. then it 
said "manually reboot the router to complete the setup". I power off the router 
waited a few second, then power on. Only power LED is flashing, nothing else.

It behave exactly same as post #30. Any idea? 

Original comment by gao...@gmail.com on 21 Sep 2014 at 11:12

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I solved the problem by using wireshark to watch what IP address is spill out 
from The router, then I changed my computer to match with that address. Restore 
tool was able to talk with router and refresh new firmware in.

Original comment by gao...@gmail.com on 22 Sep 2014 at 1:54

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Please can you tell me how I use wireshark to find out the IP address of the 
router? And then how do I change my computer's IP address?

I would pay someone to fix this router for me. Literally about to blow my 
brains out it's so frustrating.

Original comment by nick.j.s...@gmail.com on 24 Sep 2014 at 11:16

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Also when I try to download the firmware restoration file from ASUS it says 
file not found. Does anyone have it?

Original comment by nick.j.s...@gmail.com on 24 Sep 2014 at 11:22

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This video saved me:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HIoQ5Qd11pU&feature=youtu.be

cheers

Original comment by David.jm...@gmail.com on 1 Oct 2014 at 12:51

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I've had the same scenario and the solution for was the version of the firmware.
I got stuck at 57% in the restoration for the first three firmware builds I 
tried with, ending up with connection error to the device.

But when I tried with version 3.0.0.4.374.130 from 
http://support.asus.com/Download.aspx?SLanguage=en&m=RT-N56U&p=11&s=2&os=8 it 
all wnt trough, and restoration went trough perfect.

Besides that, steps below are the ones i used (which I got from above comments):
1. Download above build -> extract
2. Download ASUS RT-N65U Firmware Restoration as per OS used ->extract
3. change IP to static (192.168.1.2, 255...., 192.168.1.1)
4. disconnect all cables from router
5. hold in reset button, while plugin in power cable
6. Connect network cable router --> computer
7. run firmware restoration and choose firmware build above
----> SUCCESS

Original comment by joss.aki...@gmail.com on 10 Oct 2014 at 10:34

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I have solved the problem, but in a different way, as the Restore Tool did not 
work for me even following post #10.

Some facts that I found with my router:
1. The Recovery mode of the router is a TFTP client that puts out TFTP packets 
to a specific IP address. My router was sending TFTP packets to 192.168.1.11, 
but you can verify the IP address the router is trying to connect to using 
wireshark.
2. The router client will only accept packets from this IP address.  
3. My router didn't respond to Pings, and other posts above use ping as a test 
tool.

So, discovering the above, the solution I used was:
1. I Discovered the destination IP address that the Router TFTP client was 
polling (via Wireshark).
2. I enabled the TFTP client on the PC (google how to do this).
3. I changed my PC IP address to match the one the router was polling (see 
other posts on how to do this).
4. I downloaded the firmware to the router with the command 
tftp -i 192.168.1.1 PUT <firmware filename>
5. The download took a few minutes and worked OK, (progress can be followed on 
wireshark)
6. After a few minutes the router rebooted, and all was OK.

I have no idea why the Restoration Tool didn't work for me, but no packets were 
sent out when I tried that method. 

Original comment by leegray1...@googlemail.com on 29 Oct 2014 at 9:26

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Followed what #39 did;
Firstly, ordered brand new N56U off amazon, plugged in, followed instructions 
on easy setup. Clicked yes to upgrade firmware.... Resulted in blinking blue 
power led.

Wireshark showed noise looking for 192.168.1.11, changed PC ip to match this, 
used tftp command to transfer the oldest Firmware download from asus, 
3004374130,  took about 6 seconds to transfer the file, 60 seconds to reboot, 
and the settings from my installation were still saved.

Thank god, and leegray. Cheers!!

Original comment by JohnFJam...@gmail.com on 3 Nov 2014 at 9:05

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I've been successful with the leegray1's (#39) solution too. 

In Ubuntu (Kubuntu) Linux:

* download the newest firmware: 
http://support.asus.com/download.aspx?SLanguage=en&p=11&s=2&m=RT-N56U&os=8&hashe
did=ik8J7ZTvg1uktpab
* install TFTP client (netkit-tftp) if you don't have it
* set the computer IP address to 192.168.1.11
* open console and:
     - change directory to where the firmware file is, e.g. cd /home/peter/Download
     - connect to the router: tftp 192.168.1.1 [Enter]
     - enter these commands:
          ? [Enter] (to see what commands you can use)
          verbose [Enter]
          binary [Enter]
          put exact_firmware_filename_you_downloaded.trx
              (then you should see something like "Sent xxxxxx bytes in 6.4 seconds...")
          quit [Enter]
* wait until the router restarts itself
* done

Notes:

* I had to do it twice. For the first time nothing happened.
* I have three identical routers ASUS RT-56U and only one of them has this 
issue.

Thanks a lot for your help!

Original comment by a...@tosovsky.eu on 4 Nov 2014 at 10:26

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#39 probably works if you are familiar with tftp clients, but if you adapt the 
correct IP settings to your LAN, it works perfectly.

Have everything unplugged, hold in the button, give it power, holding the 
button until the blue light flashes... plug your LAN in, and give your Ethernet 
IPv4 settings 192.168.1.11/default subnet mask/gateway 192.168.1.1 - good to go 
after frustrating myself for an hour.  Thanks to all of you for figuring this 
stuff out!

Original comment by drewski...@gmail.com on 19 Nov 2014 at 5:45

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To anyone who gave the idea of wireshark, THANK YOU!

My problem was: I got into rescue mode, but the Asus Utility wasn't finding the 
router.

I was receiving packets from the router from IP 172.17.143.11 (thanks to 
wireshark), so I set my ip as 172.17.143.10 (and my gateway as 172.17.143.11), 
my DNS as 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220 (like #24 suggested), subnet mask 
as 255.255.255.0 and restarted the Asus utility. After the ip change, I could 
restore my router!

To everyone that helped me out, have a virtual beer!

And, if someone from Asus is watching this, PLEASE update your docs!

Original comment by theworld...@gmail.com on 9 Dec 2014 at 2:16

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I work in IT (formerly in the USA before immigrating to Singapore).

My ISP (M1) gives the RT-56u away with a two year subscription. Almost all my 
friends have them. Anyway, many of us have experienced this issue. The router 
will glitch into "rescue mode", usually during the automated firmware download.

You must change the settings on your network and run the Windows app to fix it. 
If you do not own a Windows PC you are out of luck.

I called customer support. The guy in India was rude. I hung up.

I tried the email support. They told me were to take it. I did so, but the 
queue was long. I just tossed the brand new free router in the rubbish. The 
email support tried to follow up. I told them, I disposed of the router and 
bought a different brand. It took them two weeks to come back with, "please let 
us know if you need anything else".

Original comment by phredo...@gmail.com on 18 Jan 2015 at 5:37

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2 phredog66:
> usually during the automated firmware download
What is "automated firmware download"?

Original comment by d...@soulblader.com on 19 Jan 2015 at 7:26

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You goto the web interface to set up your router for the first time. A window 
pops up asking, "would you like to update to the latest firmware?". If you 
click "YES" you are doomed! The automated update runs, and the device "bricks". 
 I know three people this happned to. 

Original comment by phredo...@gmail.com on 20 Jan 2015 at 11:40

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Had the same problem..followed post #37..Didn't set a static IP. Ran the rescue 
program and chose Padavan's RT-N56U_3.4.3.9-091_dlna.trx...worked like a charm..

Original comment by 2swe...@gmail.com on 24 Jan 2015 at 6:59

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Lets us make sure all the people who do not own Windows boxs get the word. They 
will be happy to hear. "All you have to do is load up the rescue tool and...".

Original comment by phredo...@gmail.com on 24 Jan 2015 at 10:20