So there is modified version of openwrt (called davidc502) that is meant to include a more updated set of wireless drivers for the radios in the linksys wrt32x router. It’s a pretty cool alternative that I’m glad exists which is trying to make the stability and performance better for these devices that are poorly supported by its creators. For example, I recorded the wifi module versions of openwrt vs davidc502 below:
 

# opkg list-installed | grep -i wifi
kmod-mwlwifi - 4.14.195+2019-03-02-31d93860-1
mwlwifi-firmware-88w8864 - 2019-03-02-31d93860-1

# opkg list-installed | grep -i wifi
kmod-mwlwifi - 5.4.42+2020-02-06-a2fd00bb-1
mwlwifi-firmware-88w8864 - 2020-02-06-a2fd00bb-1
mwlwifi-firmware-88w8897 - 2020-02-06-a2fd00bb-1
mwlwifi-firmware-88w8964 - 2020-02-06-a2fd00bb-1

 
However, one thing to note, when I first ran netstat on it I was surprised to see soo many running services listening on all kinds of ports, I had to go through and turn most of them off in the services tab manually: