Although I already have the Asus RT-ACRH17 at home, I couldn't resist and recently bought the JD Cloud Router and Redmi AC2100 on JD.com to play around with. To facilitate future firmware flashing and tinkering, the first thing I did was flash the breed firmware onto the Redmi AC2100.

What is breed

Breed firmware, also known as the Phoenix firmware, allows you to flash any firmware you want onto your router. It not only makes firmware flashing easy, but also reduces the risk of bricking your router. If your router supports breed flashing and you enjoy tinkering, you should definitely give it a try.

Flashing breed

Before flashing, I recommend watching this video tutorial multiple times. It's a detailed tutorial that can help you avoid some pitfalls.

Here is a brief written version for those with some basic knowledge.

1. Enable Windows telnet client

Go to Start Menu -> Settings -> Programs -> Programs and Features -> Turn Windows features on or off, and check "telnet client" (or "telnet 客户端").

2. Disable antivirus software

Disable all antivirus software (very important), and disable the Windows Firewall. I made the mistake of not disabling the firewall when I first tried to extract the flashing tool, and some files were mistakenly quarantined by my antivirus software. This caused the flashing process to fail repeatedly. So be sure to disable your antivirus software and extract the flashing tool again.

Download link for the flashing tool: RMAC2100-breed教程完整版.zip

3. Install the tools

The extracted flashing tool contains a file called npcap-0.9991.exe, which needs to be installed beforehand.

4. Connect the router

You will need 2 Ethernet cables:

• Cable 1: Connect one end to the WAN port of the router (the one near the power port), and the other end to a LAN port (any port except the WAN port).
• Cable 2: Connect one end to a LAN port, and the other end to your computer.

The setup should look like this:

5. Configure the network card

Disable any unused network cards, and configure your network card with the following settings: IP: 192.168.31.177, Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0, Default Gateway: 192.168.31.1

6. Configure the router

When you first buy the router, it is a Xiaomi router. Access the Xiaomi router's admin panel by entering 192.168.31.1 in your browser. Set up PPPOE dial-up with the username 123 and password 123. You don't need to worry about establishing a connection at this point.

7. Start the breed flashing process

Run the telnet.bat file and follow the prompts until a shell window appears. In the shell window, enter the following command and press Enter:

cd /tmp&&wget http://192.168.31.177:8081/busybox&&chmod a+x ./busybox&&./busybox telnetd -l /bin/sh

This step needs to be done quickly. Once successful, the telnet service of the RM AC2100 will be enabled. Remember to unplug the cable between the WAN and LAN ports (the brown cable in the connection diagram) after flashing breed, otherwise it may cause a network storm.

8. Flash r3gbreed

Open a command prompt window and execute the following commands one by one:

telnet 192.168.31.1
cd /tmp
# Make sure the "Task_文件服务器" process is still running, if not, run httpserver.bat in the /rm2100 folder
wget http://192.168.31.177:8081/breed-mt7621-xiaomi-r3g.bin&&nvram set uart_en=1&&nvram set bootdelay=5&&nvram set flag_try_sys1_failed=1&&nvram commit
mtd -r write breed-mt7621-xiaomi-r3g.bin Bootloader

If there are no errors, congratulations, you have successfully flashed the breed firmware. Please note that most of this tutorial is a repost, and it may be a bit messy. I recommend watching the video tutorial above first, and then refer to the written version for further clarification.

Accessing breed

1. Set your computer to obtain an IP address automatically and wait for the router to restart (when your computer obtains an IP address or when only one blue light is on, it means the breed bootloader has been successfully installed).

2. After waiting for about 5 minutes, unplug the power cable, press and hold the reset button with a toothpick, plug in the power cable, wait for the blue light to blink, and then release the reset button. Connect your computer to the router's LAN port, and access 192.168.1.1 in your browser to enter the breed web interface. When you first enter breed, remember to click "Backup Firmware" to back up the programmer firmware and EEPROM.

3. You can now flash any firmware you want (provided that the firmware is compatible with your router) from the breed interface.

User experience with RM AC2100

The RM AC2100 offers great value for money among the sub-1000Mbps routers, and it is compatible with many third-party firmware. It's a top choice among affordable home routers. Of course, if you have a bigger budget, there are even better options available.

I have flashed Padavan's firmware onto my RM AC2100, and the signal and performance are good so far. I will continue using it for a while and share my experience in the next update. In the next post, I will also share my experience with the JD Cloud Router, which allows you to earn JD Beans.

• Redmi Router AC2100 5G Dual-Band Gigabit Port
• For firmware options, you can check out EnShan: AC2100(RM2100) - Xiaomi Wireless Router

Some of the content in this article is referenced from: 红米/小米AC2100刷入r3g breed以及恢复官方boot详细教程（更新查坏块方法、pb-boot）