Router cooling hack

Just today,

I hacked my ASUS RT-N53 router (black diamond skinny wedge router) because it was overheating and kept crashing under heavy load. It's been a year now since that I bought. At first it was solid router that can handle heavy broadband load (6 people using laptops wirelessly and Netflix streaming video plus VP). It was fine for a while then it crashed even though internet kept running without any problem. It was a pretty stubborn router. How I know it crashed is that when I want to tweak the router setting using IP address via Browser. It won't pop up login screen. So I had to reboot it and finally got Login screen. It seem happen frequently and I can tell if internet was running a bit slower than usual.

I searched through website about router crash. I found out that chipset overheats when heavy broadband load happens. I already knew that before so I decided to pop off cover of Asus router and sure enough it have skinny ceramic heatsink on top of chipset (how odd!!). So I decide to use old mobo's Southbridge heatsink that is about 1" x 1" square. I had it in the junk box the whole time so I pried off the ceramic heatsink slowly to peel off the thermal tape. Then I peeled off thermal tape from ceramic heat sink then place it to SB heatsink and stuck it back to chipset then press and wiggle it to make sure it's seated well enough. Then I had to cut a square hole on bottom of Router so heatsink sticks out.

Then I need a fan, so..

I use old small CPU Fan (formally from 400mhz system) and soldered it to +/_ tip of power jack (12vdc juice). Then put router cover all back together and glued and taped 1/4th of toothpick for Fan stand and glued one end of fan on top of wedged side of router over the heatsink. Fan suck air out of router (router have plenty vents on its side so that's why).

I plugged everything back on together and Volia!! it worked!! After few hours of heavy usage, I still be able to log in Router setup via Browser.

Customer grade router tend to burn out or dies after 2 to 3 years of heavy usage because it was poorly ventilated or lousy heatsink installed on top of its chipsiet. Which is why so many failure due to this. Commercial Grade router lasts 10 years. So why not hack the router and put it good heatsink in with fan.

Some routers use 5 volts power supply and some use 12v power supply. If yours use 5v power supply, get the tall heatsink you can find. Be sure that it's small enough that it won't touch any metals standing next to it.

12vdc router can use CPU fan.

I will take pix of router that I hacked. I did not take detail picture cuz my EVO camera cannot focus. I think its iris was screwed for some reason.

Will post funny looking pix. I did that in a hurry because I don't want to be harassed by my kids and wife for not having internet. They were all gone out of town

Catty

I would like to see a picture of that! Especially where you soldered the wire.

Secretblend said:

I would like to see a picture of that! Especially where you soldered the wire.

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Will do that. I will take cover off.. To be honest with you, it was the toughest cover I've ever removed without cracking the plastic. It had many hooks that locks in its place. Asus must have done excellent job designing Router cover

It is fairly simple two-point soldering job on Power Jack terminals.

I will take pix ect when my kids are in bed so that I can take detail pix. To warn you that my EVO's camera autofocus is broken. I've tried everything to get autofocus working. It's radio button is checked on in Autofocus section even I rebooted phone ect. none avail. I think it have to do with refurbished phone that had flaw. Grr. It's gonna be a bit blurry for close up. I will also take cooling fins as well using my fingers as a size comparison

Catty

I know what you meant about the covers.. I used to repair printers and they are notorious for making it hard to take covers off. Have to take them off in certain way or they will break. Argh!!

I have Netgear WNR3500Lv2 and it is Linux based router, so I flashed with Tomato firmware - no issue, even no overheating under heavy load, such as torrent.

Some routers have overheating issue like Linksys is one of them.

Don't really have six people using anything here, but yea I used to do that a lot. I still have a modded processor here somewhere.. it went up to 3.2 GHz with this big huge heatsink, but now I can actually buy a 3.2GHz proc and not have to deal with the instability and heat.

Have FTTH here now, so have all telco-supplied equipment :P

Oc318 said:

Don't really have six people using anything here, but yea I used to do that a lot. I still have a modded processor here somewhere.. it went up to 3.2 GHz with this big huge heatsink, but now I can actually buy a 3.2GHz proc and not have to deal with the instability and heat.

Have FTTH here now, so have all telco-supplied equipment :P

Click to expand...

Not the CPU. I am talking about modding Router.. Usually its chipset overheats when there's heavy broadband load coming through. Routers commonly crashes because of one of chipset is running hot. Most routers have lousy heatsink and manufacturers allow it to shorten its life they can keep selling and make profits. You can do Router mods.

The fan which operates at 12vdc and some routers use 12vdc. If your router powered by 5vdc then you might have to find 5 vdc fan or use extra power jack that is 12vdc to operate only fan. Remmy that fan only draw .1 amp which is very little and it won't hurt a thing. I simply soldered fan +/- end to power jack terminals inside router. it's very simple.

So far for two weeks, NO CRASH!!! Yippeee Hooorraaayy!! It works so well that my entire family using laptops and VP (on Wireless bridge) and 2 PS3 all been connected wirelessly to Asus router and it handle load great. I check to see if browser pop up login screen after I typed in its IP address for setup. It still works too!

Check out photos on next post.

Catty

Here there are. I'm sorry that I didnt remove cover to show what's inside that you asked for. It's kinda redneck job that I did. Pictures are blurry cuz of my HTC EVO broken autofocus grrr!!





Cooling fin exposed under the fan







Catty