SpeedtouchUpgrade

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title: SpeedtouchUpgrade
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# HOWTO update a Thomson Speedtouch router firmware in Linux

## Overview

Thomson's series of DSL ethernet routers and modems (not USB modems) ship with a firmware updater for windows.

These instructions are for a Thomson 516v6 ADSL single-port ethernet router purchased in the UK in February 2008. The method should be identical for other Speedtouch 5xx routers.

The updater is really just a bootp, tftp and dhcp server application. This is easily duplicated in Linux.

The instructions for installing packages are Debian/Ubuntu specific. I expect most general-purpose distros to have the required packages.

Vim is my text editor, substitute yours in the following instructions.

[[_TOC_]]

## Initial Setup

Connect your Speedtouch router and your host machine to your network.

Configure your host machine with a static IP address.

Make sure you can ping the router from your host machine.

Open a terminal.

## Get Thomson MAC address

`arping 192.168.1.254`

Output should show MAC address.

Note: 192.168.1.254 is one of the two IP addresses the router is configured with by default. The other is 10.0.0.138.

## Install bootp and tftpd

`sudo apt-get install bootp tftpd-hpa`

## Configure tftpd

`sudo vim /etc/default/tftpd-hpa`

RUN_DAEMON="yes"
    OPTIONS="-l -s /var/lib/tftpboot"

| -l | run in standalone (listen mode), rather than from inetd |
||
| -s | change root directory on startup                        |

## Download Thomson firmware

I had to hunt around a bit until I found some up to date firmware.

*   <http://www.speedtouchforum.de/viewtopic.php?t=1089> 
*   <http://www.speedtouchforum.de/Daten/FW/5x6iv6/7.4/ZZQ2AA7.417.zip> 
*   <http://mirror.opensourcehub.com/pub/speedtouch/> 
*   [http://www.al-jammaz.com/spt.asp?newsID=1&ID=2&menu\_ID=5&order\_ID=4&pageDID=1][13]

wget http://www.speedtouchforum.de/Daten/FW/5x6iv6/7.4/ZZQ2AA7.417.zip
    unzip ZZQ2AA7.417.zip
    sudo cp ZZQ2AA7.417.bli /var/lib/tftpboot/

This firmware is v7.4.1.7 (international). It includes a UI configuration option for putting the router in bridge mode.

## Configure bootp

`sudo vim /etc/bootptab`

Configuration is a series of colon-separated key=value pairs

### Example

thomson:ip=192.168.1.254:ha=$MACADDR:td=/var/lib/tftpboot:hd=/:bf=ZZQ2AA7.417.bli:

| ip | IP address of the router                                                                                                                        |
||
| ha | MAC address of the router. $MACADDR should be replaced with the Speedtouch MAC address formatted as a string of hex digits. e.g. 00112233445566 |
| td | TFTP directory. The value of the "td" option must match the value of the "-s" option from /etc/default/tftpd-hpa.                               |
| hd | Path under "td" where bootfiles are found                                                                                                       |
| bf | Router firmware filename                                                                                                                        |

### Ubuntu >= 11.10 Example

In later versions of tftpd (as of Ubuntu 11.10 at least), the *td* option is now relative to the tftpd default directory (/var/lib/tftpboot). So leave out the td= option altogether. Thanks to Matthew Marks for the report.

Example:

thomson:ip=192.168.1.254:ha=$MACADDR:hd=/:bf=ZZQ2AA7.417.bli:

## Start bootp

Start bootpd as root with debugging enabled:

sudo bootpd -d4

Yes, I'm starting bootpd on the console, not as a daemon. It's easier to see debug output this way.

## Upgrade the firmware

*   Turn off the Speedtouch 
*   Hold down Reset and turn it on 
*   Continue holding for at least 10 seconds (or until the Power LED flashes red-green repeatedly and the Ethernet LED flashes green).

Output from bootpd should look something like:

bootpd: info(6):   bootptab mtime: Wed Feb 20 14:46:57 2008
    bootpd: info(6):   reading "/etc/bootptab"
    bootpd: info(6):   read 1 entries (1 hosts) from "/etc/bootptab"
    bootpd: info(6):   recvd pkt from IP addr 0.0.0.0
    bootpd: info(6):   bootptab mtime: Wed Feb 20 14:46:57 2008
    bootpd: info(6):   request from Ethernet address 00:14:7F:11:3E:01
    bootpd: info(6):   found 192.168.1.254 (thomson)
    bootpd: info(6):   requested path=""  file="BANT-V"
    bootpd: info(6):   bootfile="//ZZQ2AA7.417.bli"
    bootpd: info(6):   vendor magic field is xx.xx.xx.xx
    bootpd: info(6):   sending reply (with RFC1048 options)

If all goes well after about a minute you should be able to log into the router again with the new firmware.

## Speedtouch 716 Addendum

Courtesy of Matthew Marks:

When resetting the Speedtouch716:

*   Turn off the Speedtouch 
*   Hold down Reset and turn it on 
*   Continue holding until the Power LED turns orange.

# Links

*   Be User Group [BeBox Upgrade Procedure][14]

[13]: http://www.al-jammaz.com/spt.asp?newsID=1&ID=2&menu_ID=5&order_ID=4&pageDID=1
 [14]: http://beusergroup.co.uk/technotes/index.php/Modem_Firmware

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