For the New Year: DDWRT and a Linksys WRT54GS2

Problem
The wifi reception on my Xbox 360 was horrible after I moved my wireless router to another room.

Answer
Add a repeater in another room and boost the wifi signal throughout my house.

This was a two step process that requires two routers with one router running DD-WRT. I already had an older Linksys router running DD-WRT so I purchased a new one. I really like the DD-WRT firmware so I opted to apply it to the new router as well (as outlined below).

Note: I mention the Linksys model WRT54GS2 but you can use any supported router model.

1. Get a Linksys WRT54GS2 router (I got one from Walmart for $44)
2. Download the necessary firmware files for router at DD-WRT.com. For the WRT54GS2, there will be two (VxWorksKiller-GS2V1.bin and dd-wrt.v24_micro_generic.bin)
3. Plug in the router power and connect your computer to it (via ethernet).
4. On the computer that is connected to the router, assign a static IP (like 192.168.1.2) and set the subnet mask to 255.255.255.0.
   Note: You will not have internet access once you do this.
5. Log in to the router's web based administration page (normally it's http://192.168.1.1).
6. Now we have to prepare the router to receive the DD.WRT firmware. Go to the firmware upgrade page, click 'Browse' and choose the VxWorksKiller-GS2V1.bin file.
7. Press 'Upgrade'
8. The page should refresh, stating that the router is refreshing. Don't do anything for at least a minute or two. 
9. If successful, you should be get a ping response from the router at 192.168.1.1. The router is now prepared to accept TFTP commands.
10. Now we apply the DD-WRT firmware using TFTP. In a command prompt, type "tftp -i 192.168.1.1 put dd-wrt.v24_micro_generic.bin".
    Example: "tftp -i 192.168.1.1 put C:\dd-wrt.v24_micro_generic.bin"
11. Now wait for the router to restart. If for some reason it does not restart on it's own, wait a few minutes and manually reset it it.
12. Once reset, navigate to the router admin page at http://192.168.1.1. If successful, you should be greeted with a DD-WRT change password page (screenshot).
    
    

Congratulations! See the DD-WRT wiki for more information and help in configuring your DD-WRT router. In the next installment, I will briefly cover the steps to configure your newly upgraded DD-WRT router as a repeater.