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Airport Extreme or Express
- Thread starter Cap41
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An AirPort Express is just a basic wireless router. The advantages are a small size but a large signal range. The disadvantage is only one ethernet port (if you use a lot of ethernet), and no 802.11ac support.
An AirPort Extreme is a more powerful router. The "tall" model has a better WiFi range, and 802.11ac support. It also has more ethernet ports. It is, hover, twice the price of the Express.
An AirPort Extreme is a more powerful router. The "tall" model has a better WiFi range, and 802.11ac support. It also has more ethernet ports. It is, hover, twice the price of the Express.
I have an Express. It's attached to the router downstairs, and it's perfect for setting up my own network. (4 people can really clog a network.) The one ethernet port i use to hookup my Mac, so it's a nice little personal device.
Very important to me is that my Airport Express has "Airplay" capability and the Airport Extreme and Airport Time Capsule does not!
On the flip side, the Extreme and Time Capsule offer native Time Machine support. With the Extreme being $129 as a refurbished unit from Apple, I would personally go with the Extreme due to the AC capability, Time Machine capability, and beam forming antennas.
For a few dollars more I opted for a 2TB Refurbished Time Capsule for $199 from the Apple On-Line Store!
Absolutely! The range is much better, it offers much better performance, and native Time Machine support makes it a wonderful package!
Wait..Some of my devices does not have AC... Im not sure about iPad Air 1... See my rig below.
Some of them support wireless AC and even wireless N clients will see a nice boost over a third generation!
The Airport Express only support 100Mbps, not 1000Mbps wired network. So, IMO, it's only good for wireless network. Also, in terms of signal strength, the Airport Extreme is much better than Airport Express. And if you have any 802.11ac device (new Mac, iphone 6, etc), only the Airport Extreme support 802.11ac, which should give you much better connection speed.