I have an airport extreme base station

[honggil]

Hi guys,

Need some help and advice on what I can use a leftover Airport Extreme Base Station A1354 model.

I'm not a mac guy or techie guy... I already have a router so not sure what I can use this for.
- Should I replace it with my current Rogers (Canadian internet company) router?
- sell it? Give it away?

Any advice?

Ty!

 

[techwarrior]

The specs on this older model are only up to 300Mbps or so versus 1300Mbps for the newer model. Likely your Rogers router is faster WiFi, but if you have to pay a monthly rental on the Rogers router, this could be a suitable replacement. You would also need a modem to ditch the Rogers gear.

If your Rogers gear meets your needs, your could sell this on eBay, or give it away. It is not going to sell for much these days.

If your Rogers gear doesn't cover your space, it could be used to extend the range of your WiFi by placing it in another part of the home.

 

[honggil]

The specs on this older model are only up to 300Mbps or so versus 1300Mbps for the newer model. Likely your Rogers router is faster WiFi, but if you have to pay a monthly rental on the Rogers router, this could be a suitable replacement. You would also need a modem to ditch the Rogers gear.

If your Rogers gear meets your needs, your could sell this on eBay, or give it away. It is not going to sell for much these days.

If your Rogers gear doesn't cover your space, it could be used to extend the range of your WiFi by placing it in another part of the home.

Thank you for the brilliant response and covering all my options.

No I'm not paying a monthly fee for the router and it's one of the newer models so I won't be replacing it.

Love the option of extending the wifi range and I'll probably do that. I posted it on ebay and only getting $20 lol.. Might as well use it!

 

[Costino1]

I use them as well through my house as extenders. I love having the AirPort app making it a very easy setup.

I dont have a dead spot in my house or yard now since I picked up quite a few of them ($10-$20 as you said) online.

I don't need 1300mb/sec for any of my applications so I'm ok with 300mb/sec.

 

[jeyf]

if things work for you dont mess with it unless you are renting the Rogers box. In that case I would think in terms of replacing both the airPort & the Rogers boxes.

are you on a docsis 3.0 cable tv system buy your own docsis 3.1 combo box
or
if your on fiber get a FIOS / GOPN compatible combo box

your internet provider can guide you on which combo box(s) are provisioned for their system. You will have to physically return the rented box, make sure you get a receipt.

 

[honggil]

I use them as well through my house as extenders. I love having the AirPort app making it a very easy setup.

I dont have a dead spot in my house or yard now since I picked up quite a few of them ($10-$20 as you said) online.

I don't need 1300mb/sec for any of my applications so I'm ok with 300mb/sec.

Good idea I'm going to put one in my yard to extend the range. Was actually thinking of where I needed to get more wifi coverage.
[doublepost=1528736057][/doublepost]

if things work for you dont mess with it unless you are renting the Rogers box. In that case I would think in terms of replacing both the airPort & the Rogers boxes.

are you on a docsis 3.0 cable tv system buy your own docsis 3.1 combo box
or
if your on fiber get a FIOS / GOPN compatible combo box

your internet provider can guide you on which combo box(s) are provisioned for their system. You will have to physically return the rented box, make sure you get a receipt.

Lol slow down!! Too technical for me. Not renting the router/modem, Rogers gave it to me for free and I don't have tv in the house.

Does airport extreme base station also act function as a storage?

 

[techwarrior]

Does airport extreme base station also act function as a storage?

Yes, plug a USB drive into it and setup sharing in Airport Utility.

BTW, if you use it to extend your WiFi, it is best to connect it to the router via Ethernet cable. LAN and WAN ports are 1Gbps, probably on the Rogers router as well. If it is impractical to run ethernet across to the other side of your home, relatively inexpensive powerline adapters (go for AV1200 or AV2000 models) can use your power lines to run ethernet to remote parts of the home. When you use the Extreme as a wireless extended, it shares its radios between links to the router and clients, killing speed. But with ethernet or powerline, it will be using full radio capacity for client connections.

 

[palebluedot]

Honestly, ISP routers are crap. They have awful firmware, generally bad hardware, etc. So if I was you, I'd use this (even with slower wifi speeds) or get a better off the shelf solution.

For example, in the US people who use Comcast have to share their bandwidth with Comcast's public wifi hospot which is forced through the router. For privacy and infosec reasons alone, that cautions one to avoid ISP supplied router hardware. Maybe Rogers is different, just passing on my two cents.

 

[techwarrior]

Honestly, ISP routers are crap. They have awful firmware, generally bad hardware, etc. So if I was you, I'd use this (even with slower wifi speeds) or get a better off the shelf solution.

For example, in the US people who use Comcast have to share their bandwidth with Comcast's public wifi hospot which is forced through the router. For privacy and infosec reasons alone, that cautions one to avoid ISP supplied router hardware. Maybe Rogers is different, just passing on my two cents.

If I am not mistaken, XFinity routers (probably most ISP routers) can have the public WiFi disabled, it is just enabled by default and most consumers don't know enough to go in and change things. They also come with pre-defined SSID and passwords, which are probably retained in a DB somewhere, but again can be changed.

It is not so much ISP routers are crap, it is that ISP routers by default are crap but can be improved with a little effort.

The flip side of BYOD is that you must buy a modem and router. While it will pay for itself over time, it takes time to recover the cost. And when ISP change technology (DOCSIS 1 to 3, or soon 3.1) you are holding the bag on slower tech gear. So off to buy new gear... not that ISP will automatically upgrade your gear, but if you complain about speed, they will know you are outdated and may upgrade you.

I am a fan of BYOD, but not everyone is interested in getting into the complexities of finding the right equipment and setting it up properly. The one box is better than two is sometimes true for the less techie among us.

 

[honggil]

Yes, plug a USB drive into it and setup sharing in Airport Utility.

BTW, if you use it to extend your WiFi, it is best to connect it to the router via Ethernet cable. LAN and WAN ports are 1Gbps, probably on the Rogers router as well. If it is impractical to run ethernet across to the other side of your home, relatively inexpensive powerline adapters (go for AV1200 or AV2000 models) can use your power lines to run ethernet to remote parts of the home. When you use the Extreme as a wireless extended, it shares its radios between links to the router and clients, killing speed. But with ethernet or powerline, it will be using full radio capacity for client connections.

Thanks, I do have a powerline lying around the house so I will use that for the Extreme base. I would not run an Ethernet cable through the house to my backyard

So when you say USB drive, would an external HDD work as well connected via USB to the extreme base? And when I do this, I am able to access my external HDD from anywhere via cloud?
[doublepost=1528745398][/doublepost]

Honestly, ISP routers are crap. They have awful firmware, generally bad hardware, etc. So if I was you, I'd use this (even with slower wifi speeds) or get a better off the shelf solution.

For example, in the US people who use Comcast have to share their bandwidth with Comcast's public wifi hospot which is forced through the router. For privacy and infosec reasons alone, that cautions one to avoid ISP supplied router hardware. Maybe Rogers is different, just passing on my two cents.

Really? Give up my new Rogers router over this ancient extreme base station? XD I'm confused!

 

[techwarrior]

So when you say USB drive, would an external HDD work as well connected via USB to the extreme base? And when I do this, I am able to access my external HDD from anywhere via cloud?

Right, external HDD connected to the USB port on the Extreme. Access to the disk internally will be a snap, it should show up in Finder. For external access, a bit more complicated, though you can try enabling UPNP on the Rogers router and see if that takes care of it.

See method #3 in the following article:https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3413. The thing is, if the Extreme is not the router, you need the router to be able to forward external calls to the disk. That means, the IP Address of the Extreme should be static (or DHCP Reservation set for the Extreme) and a port forwarding rule must be enabled.

 

[honggil]

Right, external HDD connected to the USB port on the Extreme. Access to the disk internally will be a snap, it should show up in Finder. For external access, a bit more complicated, though you can try enabling UPNP on the Rogers router and see if that takes care of it.

See method #3 in the following article:https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3413. The thing is, if the Extreme is not the router, you need the router to be able to forward external calls to the disk. That means, the IP Address of the Extreme should be static (or DHCP Reservation set for the Extreme) and a port forwarding rule must be enabled.

Thank you so much for the help! Gonna try.

 

[Costino1]

Good idea I'm going to put one in my yard to extend the range. Was actually thinking of where I needed to get more wifi coverage.
[doublepost=1528736057][/doublepost]

Lol slow down!! Too technical for me. Not renting the router/modem, Rogers gave it to me for free and I don't have tv in the house.

Does airport extreme base station also act function as a storage?

Well to clarify I don’t have one outside. Doubt the humidity and environment would be good for it. I meant I have a few along the back wall inside the house which gives me adequate backyard coverage. Sorry about the confusion.

 

[palebluedot]

Right, external HDD connected to the USB port on the Extreme. Access to the disk internally will be a snap, it should show up in Finder. For external access, a bit more complicated, though you can try enabling UPNP on the Rogers router and see if that takes care of it.

See method #3 in the following article:https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3413. The thing is, if the Extreme is not the router, you need the router to be able to forward external calls to the disk. That means, the IP Address of the Extreme should be static (or DHCP Reservation set for the Extreme) and a port forwarding rule must be enabled.

You can just use Back to My Mac to connect to the Airport remotely. Works like a charm. Shows up in Finder no matter where you are in the world. Although I wonder if Apple will can Back to My Mac now.