Airport Antena or PCMCIA Ejecct Button?

So, my pretty little Alum 1.25 PB has this little pop out metal piece that extends about half an inch from the body. push once it comes out, push again it hides back into place. This, I assumed, was an airport antenna, as my Dad as a similar push metal rod that extends from the exact same place on his 867 Ti PB.

I've been very happy thinking this was what it was, until I put a PCMCIA card reader in there. Now the button would also serve the purpose of being an eject button for the PCMCIA card?! I can extend the rod out, but as soon as I push it back in it works just like an old car tape ejector. I pus it in, the card pops out.

I went to my Dad with my card, told him the issue. He swears he attached his AP card to the "antenna", but sure enough we put my card in his slot, extended the rod, and pushed it back in and it popped the PCMCIA card right out of his computer.

So, as much as it's nice to be able to remove the card easily, this is pretty annoying. Or maybe it wouldn't be annoying if I knew that what I thought was an extended AP antenna, really isn't?

Can anyone shed some light for me?

Tyler

jsw said:

It's not the antenna. It's there to eject the PCMCIA cards. The antenna is internal.

Click to expand...

So then it's one of those "I-want-to-believe" illusions that makes me think I get another bar or sometimes two when I extend it?

How about on my dad's Ti Book? He swears he attached the AP card to it when he installed it. When I showed him this he wanted to go and break open his computer again and make sure...

MoparShaha said:

That button only ejects the PCMCIA card. As jsw said, the antenna is internal. If you look at the sides of your lid on your PowerBook, you'll see two plastic things, about 5 cm long, one on each side of the lid. These are the airport antennas.

Your dad's TiBook has the antenna located near the keyboard. The Aluminum PowerBooks have better AirPort reception because the antennas are located higher up in the display.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the info guys!

Tyler