Is it possible to reboot a Linksys BEFSR41 router remotely?

Question

I have a LinkSys BEFSR41v4 router, is there a way to reboot (without doing a factory reset) this remotely from within the LAN it's connected to?

The reason I ask is that there isn't an option I can find to do this. Sometimes after using it for a few days it starts to misbehave (I suspect to do with Bit Torrent connections) and I need to reboot. I also plan to hide this unit in the attic which is miles away from where I work in the house.

Having Googled around I can't see any suggestions other than to power the unit from an X10 or similar device and power cycle it remotely that way.

I'm running firmware version 1.04.02.

Answer 1

Yes it can. Look in the firmware file, not in the web interface.

Use the curl command to reboot it read, Reboot Linksys remotely.

To use cURL in Windows read up on, URL to reboot a WebSTAR DPC2100R2 cable modem with curl?

Answer 2

Read step 7 of this:

The soft reset process for the Linksys router can be done via the Web Administration Pages. This requires the use of the Web browser of the computer. In the address bar of the Web browser, type the IP address of the Linksys router. If the user has not modified the IP address, the default is 192.168.1.1.

Answer 3

I seem to recall that the Linksys BEFSR41 had a tab labeled something like Administration and under there was something like Status. There used to be a soft reboot option there. Note that if you router is flaking out, you may not be able to get to the web interface. What do you mean when you say the router is misbehaving?

Answer 4

After a considerable amount of research it would appear that it's not possible to warm boot this router from the web based admin tools.

The router also isn't compatible with any of the WRT projects.

Answer 5

Log into the router's web admin pages and submit the settings without making any changes. The router will flash the red Diag light and that usually works for me.

Answer 6

This works on my Linksys BEFSR41 v3:

http://'':PASSWORD@192.168.1.1/Gozila.cgi?submit_button=Status_Router&submit_type=release&change_action=gozila_cgi&wan_proto=dhcp

Where it says PASSWORD, you'd put your router's password in.

Since we're using UserName:Password in the URL, and the BEFSR41's UserName is blank, you just leave the '' in there. Not sure what to call them... single quotes? ' '.

It'll automatically release the IP address and grab a new one, then redirect you to the Status_Router.htm page of the router, showing you the new IP address.

For some reason, the above doesn't work in Internet Explorer... but it works fine in Chrome and its derivatives.

So you'd create a URL shortcut on your Desktop thusly:

"C:\Program Files (x86)\SRWare Iron\iron.exe" --app=http://'':PASSWORD@192.168.1.1/Gozila.cgi?submit_button=Status_Router&submit_type=release&change_action=gozila_cgi&wan_proto=dhcp --incognito

I'm using SRWare Iron instead of Chrome. SRWare Iron strips out the Google-provided corporate spyware code. I've set it up as an app, so I can include the URL to the router, and I've used Incognito mode to prevent the browser from saving the URL (which has the router password in it).

Strange looking URL, but it actually works!

In regards to the OPs question... I believe you're right... the BEFSR41 has a limited amount of memory, and using BitTorrent on it with too many connections will cause it to act flakey (dropped connections, severely limited upload speed). It exhausts the SPI memory area, so it's forced to drop some connections.

So limiting your BitTorrent client to less than 20 connections, and refreshing your WAN IP address from time to time (which drops all connections and thus flushes the SPI memory) should keep it running good.