I had the same problem, and followed the instructions as provided in several posts on the internet, without much help. Main problem was that I could not find the Auto Upgrade Utility or TFTP.EXE anywhere on the Linksys website, although I tried to use TFTP in Windows XP Pro. It did not work; the result was Successfully transerred 311 bytes, although the file was 2.99MB in size.
I called Linksys Tech Support and got a patient chap who didn't just tell me to go buy a new router, but knew what I was looking for. The first chap hung up on me, because he didn't seem to know much more than what he was seeing on his screen prompts, which basically got him to: "Buy a new router!"
The Auto Upgrade Utility can be located by going to the donwload page for the BEFW11S4 download page (http://www.linksysbycisco.com/US/en/support/BEFW11S4/download) and selecting the v3.2 hardware, as this is the only one that displays the very particular Setup Wizard link for download; someone should lose their head over this one! Why don't they just document this. The filename is BEFW11S4-v2_SetupWizard.exe (aka the Auto Upgrade Utility). Safe it to a folder on your hard drive.
Once you have downloaded the utility and the latest firmware bin file for your router (preferably in the same folder), use these brief insstructions/tips to upgrade the router:
- Connect via an Ethernet cable to one of the router's LAN ports (not Internet/WAN port) at 10 or 100 MB/s, half-duplex; slower the better, but it worked at 100 MB/s for me. Use a static IP address such as 192.168.1.101 for your computer.
- Make sure you can ping the router from the command prompt (ping 192.168.1.1).
- Reboot the router.
- Run the utility, and use Server: 192.168.1.1, Password: admin, and locate the firmware bin File from the earlier download.
- Again, ping the router from the command prompt, just to make sure it is still connecting and not timing out.
- Click Upgrade. If all is well, the router will be upgraded without a problem.
IMPORTANT: Give the router a couple of minutes to reboot and settle down. When I upgraded the first time, the power light was still flashing and I (and the Linksys technician) thought it had failed and unplugged the router to see if a reboot would solve the problem. It did not. I repeated the steps, and this time I waited a couple of minutes, and voila(!) the power light became steady and the router worked like it was brand new again!
Hope this helps. Locating the Auto Upgrade Utility was the key to solving this problem for me.
Suny
