# Airport Extreme



## Da_iMac_Daddy (Jan 7, 2003)

No one mentioned Airport Extreme .... 54mbps transfer rates...


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## mightyjlr (Jan 7, 2003)

i think the usb printer sharing, ability to use an external antenna, and the price are more impressive features


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## Da_iMac_Daddy (Jan 7, 2003)

I haven't read into it just thought I would bring it to light


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## cockneygeezer (Jan 7, 2003)

Dear All,

www.thinksecret.com mention 802.11g wireless technology, and they were right.

I use Airport extensively in the office, and we are interested in upgrading to what, Airport 3.

After looking on the Apple website, I notice that the new cards are different and don't fit the standard Apple Airport card slot.

They mention something called the mini-PCMCIA port? Does my 15.2" PowerBook have this, or do have to use an adpator and slot in the PC CARD slot?

Thanks


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## Gnomo (Jan 7, 2003)

> _Originally posted by cockneygeezer _
> *
> 
> They mention something called the mini-PCMCIA port? Does my 15.2" PowerBook have this, or do have to use an adpator and slot in the PC CARD slot?
> *


Actually it is mini PCI.  This is completely different than PCMCIA (kinda like ISA vs PCI).  Mini PCI was developed to be a replacement for PCMCIA (something about people not liking external cards?).

I am actually happy to see Apple adopt the mini PCI port.  Most other companies (ie. Dell, Gateway, etc) use this to enable their computer with internal wireless cards. 

From reading the tech specs on the Powerbooks, it looks like only the 12" and 17" have the mini PCI port that is needed for Airport Extreme.  My guess is that we will see a new revision of the 15" powerbook and, perhaps all iBooks in the near future (meaning by next year) that will have this port.


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## Captain Code (Jan 7, 2003)

The new Airport base station looks great.  I hope that the usb printer sharing works over ethernet as well.  It also has wireless bridging.

I think you can get PCI cards that work as an adapter for mini-pci.  Hopfully Apple will release a pci version of this card so it'll be compatible with all the desktop Macs as well.


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## EvenStranger (Jan 7, 2003)

We should be seeing some aftermarket PCMCIA cards with 802.11g sometime in the next few months. Linksys is taking preorders for theirs, about $80. The only question is whether the OS will support an aftermarket card. It should, but then again, we are talking about Apple here.


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## ScottW (Jan 7, 2003)

I can already hear it coming...

I just bought a Powerbook and it doesn't even support "g".

BLA!


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## Gnomo (Jan 7, 2003)

> _Originally posted by EvenStranger _
> *The only question is whether the OS will support an aftermarket card. It should, but then again, we are talking about Apple here. *


My roommate has a pre-airport compatible G3 and uses a Cisco PCI wireless nic without any problems (well, except when he moved to Jag and had to wait for Cisco to write new drivers).  Sure you can't utilize the airport icon in the menubar, but you get a much better link scope.  The OS just treates it like another eithernet card (called Ethernet Slot 3 Port 5 in System Preferences).

It would be nice if apple released an airport extreme card that fit into the older airport slots for their slightly older machines (hey they sell adapter cards for the old "airport read" G3s), but only time will tell (perhaps if they see enought demand for them).


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## spitty27 (Jan 7, 2003)

So the new AirPort Extreme Card would not fit in my Pismo???  !!!!

Maybe it's time for a new 17" PowerBook **drool**


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## Gnomo (Jan 8, 2003)

> _Originally posted by spitty27 _
> *So the new AirPort Extreme Card would not fit in my Pismo???  !!!!*


Afraid not.  So, who is up for starting a petition?


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## leadfootedfool (Jan 8, 2003)

> _Originally posted by ScottW _
> *I can already hear it coming...
> 
> I just bought a Powerbook and it doesn't even support "g".
> ...




I just bought a Powerbook and it doesn't even support "g".

Would be nice, but I don't feel like shelling out for another base station so I don't really care.  And besides, if i need speed that bad I can always just plug it in.


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## leadfootedfool (Jan 8, 2003)

And besides, who wants an aluminium case when you can have TI!


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## Hobeaux (Jan 8, 2003)

the card itself is completely different from the old 802.11b version. as a result the card itself is not compatible with the older products. 

If you want to communicate at 54Mbs you'll need new hardware (new powerbook and new base station). sad, but true.


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## fryke (Jan 8, 2003)

or, as stated before, a PC-card adapter with OS X drivers. Not there yet, but I'm sure they'll arrive.

Also, we'll see even cheaper Wireless Access Points now that 802.11g arrives. What do I care about 54 Mbps? I rather buy a cheap second 802.11b WAP and extend my RANGE!


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## JetwingX (Jan 8, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Hobeaux _
> *the card itself is completely different from the old 802.11b version. as a result the card itself is not compatible with the older products.
> 
> If you want to communicate at 54Mbs you'll need new hardware (new powerbook and new base station). sad, but true. *




uh... * NO * it's backwards compatable with any 802.11b device (not "a" though) quoted directly from one of the apple employes @ the expo

and a quote from apples site

Even with its increased performance AirPort Extreme is compatible with all AirPort products, as well as Wi-Fi certified 802.11b wireless products5.  This means that the range of AirPort Extreme is up to 150 feet.  For higher performance you need to have both the Airport Extreme Card and the AirPort Extreme base Station.  The range of AirPort Extreme is up to 50 feet at 54 Mbps.


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## Captain Code (Jan 8, 2003)

The protocol it uses is compatible with old Airport cards & base stations, but the cards themselves won't fit in the old Airport slots that are in all the previous laptops and desktops.


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## ghyde (Jan 14, 2003)

What are the router requirments for the extreme card (ie, does it need the airport base station to benefit from the 56 meg speeds and other enhancements)?
It the range any better?

Of course, the apple sites do little to answer these questions.


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## Dusky (Jan 14, 2003)

> What are the router requirments for the extreme card (ie, does it need the airport base station to benefit from the 56 meg speeds and other enhancements)? It the range any better?



Both new card and new base station must be present to take advantage of 54mbps speed.  If you have the new station, and you have an old card, you'll be getting 802.11b speed... 11mbps.  If you have a new card, but an old base station, I'm not even sure it'll work...  but if it does...  again...  you'll be getting 802.11b.

As to the range....  the great benefit of the new base stations is the ability to connect an external antenna (no, not your rabbit ears) that can double (?) the range.  The base station itself gives you 150 feet range.

Another good thing is the USB port on the base station...  to connect a printer.

I dig both of the above...  don't care much for the 54mbps.

For more info:  http://www.apple.com/airport


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## mightyjlr (Jan 14, 2003)

> Both new card and new base station must be present to take advantage of 54mbps speed.  If you have the new station, and you have an old card, you'll be getting 802.11b speed... 11mbps.  If you have a new card, but an old base station, I'm not even sure it'll work...  but if it does...  again...  you'll be getting 802.11b.




If you have a new card and an old base station it WILL work.


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## Dusky (Jan 14, 2003)

> If you have a new card and an old base station it WILL work.



But at 802.11b quality (11mbps), correct?  A necessary clarification...


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## ghyde (Jan 15, 2003)

What kind of range does the extreme card get? For that matter, what is the range for the non-extreme card?  
I thought I saw somwhere that the non-ex card range is 50 feet, which dosen't sound right when other cards reach 1500 feet.


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## Dusky (Jan 15, 2003)

> What kind of range does the extreme card get? For that matter, what is the range for the non-extreme card?
> I thought I saw somwhere that the non-ex card range is 50 feet, which dosen't sound right when other cards reach 1500 feet.



It's not the card alone...  it's the ABS, too.  If the card and the ABS are the latest, the range is 150 feet, but you can plug an external antenna to the base station to get about 250 feet (or 300, i forget).  With the older ABS and card, you get 150 feet, and no way to extend it (non-hack ways, I mean).


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## ghyde (Jan 16, 2003)

Why is the Airport range so much less than other cards (like slipstream, Lucent) which are at least 10 times greater?????


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## Dusky (Jan 16, 2003)

> Why is the Airport range so much less than other cards (like slipstream, Lucent) which are at least 10 times greater?????



Ten times greater?  Nah...  show us one.  Other base stations are cheaper, and have greater range...  300 feet is what i remember.  But ten times greater range than airport?!


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## dtmdoc (Jan 16, 2003)

How about the remaining apple hardware lineup?
With the exception of the G3 iMacs, do you think there
will be minor revisions to incorporate AE into them?  Otherwise
this upgrade doesnt make much sense because only the 
new AlBooks will be able to use AE


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## brianleahy (Jan 16, 2003)

Of course, it's worth pointing out that most DSL and Cable Modem connections top out around a mere 1.5 Mbps.  

So if you use your Airport strictly for surfing via cable or DSL,  the old-fashioned 11 Mbps is already overkill.  Upgrading to Airport Extreme will offer you no internet speed advantage.  

Now, networking with other Macs or PCs would be faster.   And yes, the wireless USB connection is very cool.   But surfing.....


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## Dusky (Jan 16, 2003)

> How about the remaining apple hardware lineup?  With the exception of the G3 iMacs, do you think there will be minor revisions to incorporate AE into them?



Fryke took care of that question.  This is what he said:



> as stated before, a PC-card adapter with OS X drivers. Not there yet, but I'm sure they'll arrive.



We can only speculate.


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## dave17lax (Jan 16, 2003)

don't you guys read slashdot? we can pump up the range to kilometers if you have a couple of base stations with directional pringles can antennas!


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## Triangle (Jan 17, 2003)

I'm wondering if the new ABE can maintain an 11mbps (to a LCD Imac) and a 54mbps (to a new PB) connection at the same time. Or does it switch back to the speed of te client with lowest speed?


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## fryke (Jan 17, 2003)

to clear things up again, although it's really easy...

If you have a 802.11g client card, you need an 802.11g base station (doesn't have to be an Apple branded one, though) to get the 54 Mbps throughput. With an older 802.11b base station, you'll get the 11 Mbps that the base station provides.

The 802.11g client card DOESN'T fit into the old AirPort slots we all have (as I assume there are not yet many new PowerBooks out there...) 

The range the AirPort Base Station has is 'quite good'. Some other makers' base stations are better, some cheaper.

The new Apple Base Station can maintain a 54 Mbps and 11 Mbps link at the same time. Apple's site says: "Thats because the AirPort Extreme Base Station features a compatibility mode that automatically supports not just the AirPort Extreme Card (at data rates up to 54Mbps), but all 802.11b-compliant products (at data rates up to 11Mbps)  Mac or Windows  as its default setting."


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## Triangle (Jan 17, 2003)

> _Originally posted by fryke _
> *The new Apple Base Station can maintain a 54 Mbps and 11 Mbps link at the same time. Apple's site says: "That?s because the AirPort Extreme Base Station features a compatibility mode that automatically supports not just the AirPort Extreme Card (at data rates up to 54Mbps), but all 802.11b-compliant products (at data rates up to 11Mbps) ? Mac or Windows ? as its default setting." *



Yep I've read that, but it does not say at the same time. At least as far as I can read english. I know it is capable of a sort of auto-sensing / auto-switching but really maintain 2 links with 2 different speeds at the same time...? I could easily read that as supported, but at the lowest speed.


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## bobomac (Jan 17, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Triangle _
> *I know it is capable of a sort of auto-sensing / auto-switching but really maintain 2 links with 2 different speeds at the same time...? I could easily read that as supported, but at the lowest speed. *



I just got the Linksys Wireless-G access point and it's connected to a PC laptop @54Mbps and an iMac @11Mbps at the same time.  Since both the Linksys and Airport Extreme use the same chipset (Broadcom... one of the reasons I got the Linksys), I would assume Airport Extreme can handle both at the same time as well.


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## phatsharpie (Jan 17, 2003)

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=107372

From the Apple website:

Mixing clients on an AirPort Extreme network 

When you mix 802.11b (AirPort) and 802.11g (AirPort Extreme) clients on an AirPort Extreme network, each type of client receives an appropriate data throughput rate. The 802.11g clients continue to receive data at a higher rate than 802.11b clients.


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## Gnomo (Jan 18, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Triangle _
> *I'm wondering if the new ABE can maintain an 11mbps and a 54mbps connection at the same time. Or does it switch back to the speed of te client with lowest speed? *



Just to clear this up.  If you have a 802.11g client and a 802.11b client and a 802.11g base station.  

The 802.11g client will get the 54 Mbps speed when it transmits and the 802.11b client will get the 11 Mbps speed when it transmits.

It can do this because the client are on completely different radio bands.  802.11g runs @ 5 GHz and 802.11b @ 2.4 GHz. 

If there is any slow down for the 802.11g computer it will be a transmit delay (can't talk while the other one is) due to the 802.11b clients taking longer to transmit what they need to, but even that is assuming that the base stations are not capable of transmitting at both 5 GHz and 2.4 GHz at the same time.


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## Gnomo (Jan 18, 2003)

> _Originally posted by fryke _
> *a PC-card adapter with OS X drivers.*


Fryke, are you refering to a PCI card adapter? or a PCMCIA card adapter?

If you are thinking PCMCIA, I don't think such a thing would work.  I can't find any specs on the new Airport Extreme cards, but they appear to be too big to fit in the compact area of a pcmcia card slot.


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## aishafenton (Jan 18, 2003)

How does the Airport Base Station get on with walls? 

I've read that the range is between 150 to 200 meters, but does that include walls being in the way?

For instance, If I set my base station up in my lounge and went into my bedroom about 5 meters away and closed the door, would it work? Or does it have to be line of sight?


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## Dusky (Jan 18, 2003)

> For instance, If I set my base station up in my lounge and went into my bedroom about 5 meters away and closed the door, would it work? Or does it have to be line of sight?



Goes through walls/doors/windows.  I used to have my ABS in the kitchen....three walls away.  And the distance?  Mmm...  no way to measure it right now.

I currently have it in a diff place, bt still going through three walls.  It's like two rooms away, you could say.  Signal?  Four out of four, according to the airport icon on the menubar...  and about 70%, according to Internet Connect's gauge/scale.

Just gotta keep it away from microwaves and 2.4Ghz wireless telephones, or you'd be coming to us to help you configure your ABS so that it doesn't get you offline when someone calls, or when someone is hungry...


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## mightyjlr (Jan 18, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Gnomo _
> *Just to clear this up.  If you have a 802.11g client and a 802.11b client and a 802.11g base station.
> 
> The 802.11g client will get the 54 Mbps speed when it transmits and the 802.11b client will get the 11 Mbps speed when it transmits.
> ...



nope, 802.11b and 802.11g both run on the 2.4ghz band.


http://www.linksys.com/edu/wirelessstandards.asp


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## Dusky (Jan 18, 2003)

> 802.11g runs @ 5 GHz



Like mightyjlr has already implied, the statement above is false.  You're thinking of 802.11a.


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## Gnomo (Jan 19, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Dusky _
> *Like mightyjlr has already implied, the statement above is false.  You're thinking of 802.11a. *


I stand corrected.


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## ghyde (Jan 20, 2003)

To glean from the above posts: range can be influenced by the wireless router  (Or Access Point being used, correct)?

Any discussion on the advantages of using Access Points (esp with the airport cards --extreme and unextreme)


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## sheepguy42 (Jan 22, 2003)

The frequency compatibility of 802.11g and 802.11b has a lot to do with why Apple went with 802.11g and not 802.11a.


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## fryke (Jan 22, 2003)

PC-Cards are what a long time ago was called PCMCIA cards. And I'm quite positive that third party developers will come out with PC-Cards capable of doing 802.11g, aren't you?


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## Gnomo (Jan 22, 2003)

> _Originally posted by fryke _
> *I'm quite positive that third party developers will come out with PC-Cards capable of doing 802.11g, aren't you? *


I am certain that third party developers will come out with 802.11g cards.  However it is important to note that the Airport slot (in Dual USB iBooks at least) will not accept non-airport cards.  (The computer powers on, but will never even get to the boot loader).  Also, the airport card has a unique antenna connector, so some cards (like ones made by Aironet/Cisco/Dell) will not connect to the computer's internal antenna (unless there is an adapter, but I don't know if one exists).

I think that is where third party developers need to focus their attention: Creating a Airport slot compatible 802.11g card.


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## ghyde (Jan 22, 2003)

Referring to access points (which have anntannas (sp)), what ballpark ranges can I expect with the old airport card and thr G4 powerbook? Is it extended?


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## ghyde (Jan 22, 2003)

Oops, dup post.


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