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Airport Extreme and U-Verse

TWO2SEVEN

TWO2SEVEN

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Jun 27, 2010
3,531
741
Plano, TX
I have internet only through AT&T (U-Verse). My signal strength is really poor, even in a 1000 sq ft apartment. I have a 5th gen Airport Extreme that is being delivered today. I just wanted to figure out the best way to set it up. I would like to have all of the wifi go through the AE.

I am thinking(hoping) it will be as simple as connecting the AE directly to the U-Verse "gateway" and disabling wifi on the gateway. Is this the case?

Thanks!
 
TWO2SEVEN said:
I have internet only through AT&T (U-Verse). My signal strength is really poor, even in a 1000 sq ft apartment. I have a 5th gen Airport Extreme that is being delivered today. I just wanted to figure out the best way to set it up. I would like to have all of the wifi go through the AE.

I am thinking(hoping) it will be as simple as connecting the AE directly to the U-Verse "gateway" and disabling wifi on the gateway. Is this the case?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

Yes. I helped SPNarwhal with this same exact thing. Most U-Verse gateways do not support a true bridge mode. You need to use IP Passthrough on the U-Verse gateway and DHCP & NAT mode on the AirPort for this to work.
 
Altemose said:
Yes. I helped SPNarwhal with this same exact thing. Most U-Verse gateways do not support a true bridge mode. You need to use IP Passthrough on the U-Verse gateway and DHCP & NAT mode on the AirPort for this to work.
Click to expand...

You wouldn't happen to have instructions for that would you? :)
 
TWO2SEVEN said:
I have internet only through AT&T (U-Verse). My signal strength is really poor, even in a 1000 sq ft apartment. I have a 5th gen Airport Extreme that is being delivered today. I just wanted to figure out the best way to set it up. I would like to have all of the wifi go through the AE.

I am thinking(hoping) it will be as simple as connecting the AE directly to the U-Verse "gateway" and disabling wifi on the gateway. Is this the case?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

I have the triple play from UV now, but before, had a similar setup as you. All I had to do was turn off the wireless on the UV router and connect the WWW feed via ethernet cable to the AE. I got offshore tech support after hours for one question about getting into the webpage to alter the router settings and they were useless. Applecare fixed me up in about sixty seconds and it worked o mess, no fuss. After turning off the UV router wireless, AP Utility did all the work automatically.

Now UV, if you have TV as well, comes with a halfway decent wireless router that feeds any TV in the house, no cables required. I ran a cable three feet from it to my TC/AP and it booted straight up immediately with zero input from me. Now I have two wireless options. If the TC fails, the UV can serve as a backup. Both are on at all times on different channels and there's no interference. Generally the Apple is faster and reaches further though. With my 1000mw USB wireless adapter, it doesn't matter. I can pick up WLANs nearly a half mile away with that thing. (Premiertek PL-18N). I think I got one on Mars one night :)


UV support is OK during USA biz hours. You'll get someone usually in N. America. If not, hang up and play the lotto until you get someone who says his name is Tom and he sounds like that actually is his name. Otherwise, forget UV, or any other ATT support offshore. HORRIBLE. As long as you're under warranty, Apple, for me at least, has always graciously helped connect all of my gizmos together, whether they have an "i" in front of the name or not. AWESOME.
 
TWO2SEVEN said:
I have internet only through AT&T (U-Verse). My signal strength is really poor, even in a 1000 sq ft apartment. I have a 5th gen Airport Extreme that is being delivered today. I just wanted to figure out the best way to set it up. I would like to have all of the wifi go through the AE.

I am thinking(hoping) it will be as simple as connecting the AE directly to the U-Verse "gateway" and disabling wifi on the gateway. Is this the case?

Thanks!
Click to expand...
I switched from Time Warner Cable to U-verse a couple of weeks ago, and wanted to use my 6th generation AirPort Extreme for all router functions (except for Ooma, but that's another story). In my case, the gateway provided by AT&T is the Motorola (Arris) NVG589.

It's possible to leave the gateway's default settings unchanged, connect the AE to the gateway, and set the AE to "bridge" mode, which I think is what you are asking about. I tried this initially, and while it functioned as expected, I lost my ability to create a Guest network, because the AE doesn't support it while in bridge mode.

If you have the same gateway, you can find excellent instructions here. In my case, I:
  • Followed the steps for setting the gateway to "Passthrough Mode"
  • Used AirPort Utility on my MacBook Pro to configure the AE to use the 10.0.1.x IP range, (in order to avoid a conflict with the gateway) and the AE to "DHCP and NAT."
  • Left the gateway's Firewall settings enabled, but disabled Packet Filters, as per the instructions cited above
  • Disabled the gateway's Wireless function

All is working as expected.

I think this procedure will also work for the NVG510 gateway.

Just follow the steps in the link. If you have any questions, I'd be happy to help.
 
I have (or had, until ATT sold out to Frontier in CT) ATT Uverse.
Here's how I set mine up:

First, I think you will want to connect via a WIRED connection to the Uverse residential gateway, and then....

Turn OFF wireless on the residential gateway (Uverse "modem/router").

Next, connect the Airport Extreme to one of the LAN ethernet ports on the residential gateway.

Now, you should disconnect from the residential gateway, and connect via ethernet (for the moment only) to the AE.

Got a good wired connection?
Fine, open Airport Utility.

In the Base Station tab, give it the name and password you wish.

In the Internet tab, choose DHCP.

In the Wireless tab, choose to "create a wireless network", and set up the rest of the choices in that panel as you wish.

Now move to the "Network" tab and for "Router Mode", choose "Off (Bridge Mode)".

Save the changes.

Set up this way, the residential gateway does the NAT and serves as the basic (wired) router. The Airport Extreme has NAT turned off so you don't end up in a "dual NAT" situation, which causes problems for some folks. AE still works as a second router/switch and gives you best wireless speeds.

That seems to work fine for me.
If I've made an error, I'm sure others will jump in with corrections...
 
TWO2SEVEN said:
I got everything up and running. Thanks everyone!
Click to expand...

Do you have problems accessing certain sites? I followed the directions on http://www.dslreports.com/faq/17734 but am having a little trouble.

For example, netflix just hangs and won't load at all. I checked it via my LTE hotspot and it loaded up right away, so I know it is not netflix. Also, one of my client's websites has trouble loading up through Uverse, but again works just fine over my Tmobile LTE hotspot.
 
CostaMoses said:
Do you have problems accessing certain sites? I followed the directions on http://www.dslreports.com/faq/17734 but am having a little trouble.

For example, netflix just hangs and won't load at all. I checked it via my LTE hotspot and it loaded up right away, so I know it is not netflix. Also, one of my client's websites has trouble loading up through Uverse, but again works just fine over my Tmobile LTE hotspot.
Click to expand...

I haven't had any issues at all with my connection since switching to the AE.
 
Before going out and buying a new router, when I was in my Apartment with AT&T's combo modem/router, I had constant drops when streaming movies, etc. but the internet always seemed to come back and a reboot, etc. I was going crazy and couldn't figure out for the life of me what was going on.

I ended up changing the channel the WiFi was broadcasting on, and that solved my speed issues, range, as well as random internet drops/disconnects. Now the actual AT&T service is a whole different story, but, maybe try changing the WiFi channel as a simple fix and see if it works before going to more "extreme" measures (pun intended :p)
 
CostaMoses said:
Do you have problems accessing certain sites? I followed the directions on http://www.dslreports.com/faq/17734 but am having a little trouble.

For example, netflix just hangs and won't load at all. I checked it via my LTE hotspot and it loaded up right away, so I know it is not netflix. Also, one of my client's websites has trouble loading up through Uverse, but again works just fine over my Tmobile LTE hotspot.
Click to expand...
You might want to try disabling IPv6 on the gateway. I was experiencing the same problems with some websites, and turning off IPv6 made a difference. If you have an NVG589 gateway, go to the user interface, then Home Network>Configure>IPv6 Off.
 
gc916 said:
You might want to try disabling IPv6 on the gateway. I was experiencing the same problems with some websites, and turning off IPv6 made a difference. If you have an NVG589 gateway, go to the user interface, then Home Network>Configure>IPv6 Off.
Click to expand...

I meant to come back to this post earlier, but got distracted by moving/unpacking boxes.

I disabled IPv6 and all seems to be working well now. Thank you for the tip!
 
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