Whilst this is taking place, you should also see the ‘log viewer’ in the TFTPD demon begin to fill up, and a small file transfer box will appear on screen as the binary firmware is copied across to the device.
The lights should all go out briefly and the power light should turn red, then orange, to indicate that the update is taking place. Select OK and restart the TFTPD application.Īt this point, you should now perform a factory reset on the TG582N by pushing a paperclip into the small reset hole on the back of the device (whilst it remains powered-on).
router’ to your machine’s manual IP and set the mask to ‘255.255.255.0’. Then on the DHCP tab, set the pool address to ‘192.168.1.254’, the size of pool to ‘1’ and enter the name of the firmware – which should be in the same folder as TFTPD – into the ‘Boot file’ field. Tick ‘Bind TFTP to this address’ and select your internal static IP (in my case 192.168.1.2). Launch the application and open the settings screen, then select the TFTP tab. bin file for the firmware you’ve found, in my case this one ( mirror), into the TFTPD folder.
Install this into the root of your ‘C’ drive. Now you’ll need to install TFTPD32, which seems the most popular TFTP server for this purpose. Flashing via TFTP…įirstly, you need to connect the router directly to your Windows machine via ethernet, and give your machine a static IP address on the Technicolor router in your Windows networking settings. The A&A wiki advised there was a second method to update, using TFTP (a very simple FTP server), to capture the device during the BOOTP session following a factory reset and use this to copy firmware to it.
If the Windows software wouldn’t let me flash the device, I wondered if there might be another way. I attempted to apply this using the Thompson update software, but again it wasn’t even recognised as appropriate for the device.
However, during my search I did manage to find what I believed to be some ‘generic’ firmware. This failed to apply successfully, but thankfully didn’t brick the device. I did stumble across some basic Windows software for flashing the device, but this failed to recognise any of the firmware I found, apart from an O2 Broadband file. This matter was complicated because most TG582N devices run with a DANT-T circuit board, but the one from BE (along with a few other ISPs) runs with the much rarer DANT-1 board. Some searching turned up a few firmware images here and there, but nothing which seemed compatible. The first thing I found was that ‘generic’ firmware didn’t seem to exist, that Thompson dealt only with ISPs and did not provide support to members of the public. However I still wondered if there might be a way to unlock this, and install some generic Thompson firmware. Some quick searches on the net and consultation with colleagues convinced me I’d probably purchased an expensive paperweight, good for little more than checking that a line syncs ok with the telephone exchange.
On some ISP routers it is possible to remove some restrictions by deleting the isp.def or other files via FTP, but the BE device was locked down further than this. This was locked down to the extent that even the PPP login settings were omitted from the web interface (although they were available, buried via the clunky Telnet interface). However when it arrived I found it was actually branded to BE Broadband. I managed to grab a cheap Technicolor TG582N, believing it to be a generic model, not branded to any particular ISP and therefore believed the firmware would not be locked down. I decided to purchase one from eBay with the view to use it for experimenting and diagnosing connection issues elsewhere. I have Virgin Media cable at home and therefore did not own an ADSL router. I now work for an ISP, and during my training I’d become more interested in ADSL technologies.
Perhaps I should explain the background first. This post will probably be the most niche thing I’ve ever written.