Airport extending help question! Please help!

[gotohamish]

Here's the setup:

1 x PowerMac with Airport Card
1 x TiBook with Airport Card
1 x Graphite (Rev 1) Base Station.

The PowerMac is connected to the net via Ethernet from my Asante Router, and so is the Base Station that sits on top of the PowerMac.

Now, I live in a think-bricked Victorian house in England, and Airport isn't too good at long distances thanks to this, but I can get half way through the house.

So the question is, as the PowerMac has an Airport card, can I set this up as a Software Base Station, then plug in the Base Station halfway through the house (mains only, no connection), and configure it to bridge the PowerMac's signal, so my TiBook can pick it up in other parts of the house?

HELP! It would be fantastic to hear your suggestions and ideas on this.

Best regards
Hamish

[Falleron]

Originally posted by gotohamish
Here's the setup:

1 x PowerMac with Airport Card
1 x TiBook with Airport Card
1 x Graphite (Rev 1) Base Station.

The PowerMac is connected to the net via Ethernet from my Asante Router, and so is the Base Station that sits on top of the PowerMac.

Now, I live in a think-bricked Victorian house in England, and Airport isn't too good at long distances thanks to this, but I can get half way through the house.

So the question is, as the PowerMac has an Airport card, can I set this up as a Software Base Station, then plug in the Base Station halfway through the house (mains only, no connection), and configure it to bridge the PowerMac's signal, so my TiBook can pick it up in other parts of the house?

HELP! It would be fantastic to hear your suggestions and ideas on this.

Best regards
Hamish
In theory you should be able to. I have had the same problems in those sort of houses. However, I dont have to much experience with setting up a software base station. I am sure its possible + I am sure someone will give you a definate answer.

Why dont you try it? No harm done if it does not work. I guess the only think you need to watch out for is that you dont have 2 DHCP servers (in your base station + your other router).

[gotohamish]

Originally posted by Falleron
In theory you should be able to. I have had the same problems in those sort of houses. However, I dont have to much experience with setting up a software base station. I am sure its possible + I am sure someone will give you a definate answer.

Why dont you try it? No harm done if it does not work. I guess the only think you need to watch out for is that you dont have 2 DHCP servers (in your base station + your other router).

I've just been trying it, to no avail. I'm no expert at configuring base stations/software bs either, so I'd really appreciate the experience help of the MR community!

It seems such a waste of range to have my BS sitting on top of my PowerMac!

[conceptdev]

These two links should help.

How to bridge with a graphite airport from apple (http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106021&SaveKCWindowURL=http%3A%2F%2Fkbase.info.apple.com%2Fcgi-bin%2FWebObjects%2Fkbase.woa%2Fwa%2FSaveKCToHomePage&searchMode=Assisted&kbhost=kbase.info.apple.com&showButton=false&randomValue=100&showSurvey=false&sessionID=anonymous|167057834)

Configuring the graphite to bridge from apple (http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=58597&SaveKCWindowURL=http%3A%2F%2Fkbase.info.apple.com%2Fcgi-bin%2FWebObjects%2Fkbase.woa%2Fwa%2FSaveKCToHomePage&searchMode=Assisted&kbhost=kbase.info.apple.com&showButton=false&randomValue=100&showSurvey=false&sessionID=anonymous|167057834)

Good Luck.

[SoonToGetAMac]

"Note: When you use an AirPort-equipped computer as an AirPort Software Base Station, the bridging feature is not available. " says the second article. You may just want to sell the Base Station and get an AP Extreme one where you can add in an antenna (Dr. Bott). Then, you could also sell the AirPort card in your Power Mac since the AP Extreme models have an ethernet jack for connecting to a computer. (EDIT: Fixing numerous errors.)

[gotohamish]

Thanks for all the help guys! I'll look into those articles.

[kaizer]

Don't know this will help or not, but I've heard that there's a wifi extender for Wintel machines. If I'm not mistaken, it's available at Radioshack. It's a small black box with a arial sticking out.

I'm sorry if I've turned you into a blind corner. As I've only come to know this product's existence from TechTV.