Can't find airport . . . . help!

[nhcowboy1]

Just bought this laptop. It's supposed to have airport extreme. The seller even gave me the software installation disc for Airport Extreme. Only problem is that I can't seem to find the card . . . it isn't showing up in profiler!

Seems like it should be pretty straightforward - either it's there or it isn't. Is there anything else I should do?

[davidwarren]

what laptop is it?

[nhcowboy1]

12" aluminum pb

[McGiord]

The Airport Extreme is a wireless base station where you connect to, not the wireless adapter from your mac.
Ask the seller what wireless device/adapter he gave you with the pb12"?
________
Lansing Metal Center (http://www.chevy-wiki.com/wiki/Lansing_Metal_Center)

[GimmeSlack12]

Not hard to physically look for it, pull up the keyboard. There are two tabs at the top of the keyboard, if you look carefully you'll see them. Hold them down and pull it up, you'll be able to see the Airport and RAM parts of the machine.

EDIT: Airport Extreme is a protocol synonymous with 802.11g on Macs. Not necessarily meaning a base station.

[nhcowboy1]

Huh, what? Shouldn't it be enough to just look in the profiler?

Okay, but I don't see the tabs . . .

[GimmeSlack12]

The tabs are pretty inconspicuous. Just look for somewhere to get your fingernails under. Yeah the profiler should be enough, but you don't know if its malfunctioning or physically not there. There's a difference.
If it is there and not working make sure the cable that connects to it is firmly placed.

[nhcowboy1]

Seriously, I have no idea where to look for these tabs . . . all I'm succeeding in doing is pulling keys off the keyboard!

Is there a diagram online I could look at?

[GimmeSlack12]

Ok on my 12" iBook the tabs are just to the side of the ESC key and F12. You see that?

[nhcowboy1]

Yeah, I don't think it's the same on the powerbook. I looked up removing airport card and removing keyboard on ifixit.com - and both procedures involved removing lots of screws . . . .

Also, the keyboard on this machine is already not sitting right . . . I don't want to do something to make it worse. That's already one of the things I have to go back to the seller about.

If the only way I can get to the airport card is to take the whole thing apart, I think maybe I'm done.

[motulist]

On a powerbook you just need to open up the [battery] area if you just want to see if an airport card is installed there. (iirc)

Open the battery bay up and then you can see the airport slot inside that. No screws required.

see figure 3 on apple's instructions here
http://www.info.apple.com/usen/cip/pdf/pbg4/pbg4_15fw800_apx.pdf

[nhcowboy1]

Motulist -

THANK YOU!!! I was able to do it, relatively easily. I removed the card, reinstalled it, reconnected the antenna, put back the battery, and . . . nothing. Still no airport card showing up in profiler. So either the card is crap or there's a problem with the antenna. Or something else is going on that I don't know about.

I am now going to be able to sleep peacefully (albeit briefly), while I dream about all the terrible things I want to do to the guy who sold this to me!

Many, many thanks for your help!

Judith

[motulist]

You're welcome! And thanks for the thanks. :)