Older Airport/Macs vs Ipad and Airport printer

[EmersonMitchell]

I have an old Airport Extreme and two old Macs. Airport is the old round one that needs admin utility 4.2. Most modern Mac is an Ibook 1.42 ghz G4. Older mac attached to airport is a 350 mhz powerpc g4.

Airport works. Puzzle is about upgrades. Both Macs are on OS X 10.4.11, and I want an Ipad. Which requires OS X 10.5 to initialize.

The 350 mhz MAC cannot upgrade OS. Apple says the Ibook G4 can, but only to Leopard not Snow Leapord. So I bought Leopard. But am investigating before upgrade!

Will old Airport still connect the two Macs is first question.

Second question: can I share a firewire drive across Airport once I have OS X Leopard? To my older Mac from the Ibook?

Third Question: our multifunction printer is a USB printer wired to older Mac. It is dying. Can I get an Airport multifunction printer and support it across the old Airport to both Macs?

Any response will be helpful. I have other geeks around who say 'sure' but if I get half way thru upgrade and it dies that would be a mess. Wifes living depends on Macs functioning!

I will post to this thread once I start actually doing things and let youall share my experience.

No suggestion to buy a newer Mac will be appreciated.

thanks

 

[MacTech68]

I have an old Airport Extreme and two old Macs. Airport is the old round one that needs admin utility 4.2. Most modern Mac is an Ibook 1.42 ghz G4. Older mac attached to airport is a 350 mhz powerpc g4.

Airport works. Puzzle is about upgrades. Both Macs are on OS X 10.4.11, and I want an Ipad. Which requires OS X 10.5 to initialize.

The 350 mhz MAC cannot upgrade OS. Apple says the Ibook G4 can, but only to Leopard not Snow Leapord. So I bought Leopard. But am investigating before upgrade!

Will old Airport still connect the two Macs is first question.

Shouldn't be a problem. 10.4.11 supports Appletalk over TCP/IP so I don't see a problem there. I'd recommend maxing out the RAM to 1.5GB and ensure your Hard Drive has plenty of free space for the upgrade - backup first!

Second question: can I share a firewire drive across Airport once I have OS X Leopard? To my older Mac from the Ibook?

If you have an older Graphite or grey coloured Airport, it will work, but due to the graphite Airport having a slow CPU and only 802.11b file sharing is a pain at best. If you're already doing this, then it should function the same way.

Third Question: our multifunction printer is a USB printer wired to older Mac. It is dying. Can I get an Airport multifunction printer and support it across the old Airport to both Macs?

Difficult to support a multifunction printer (IE getting printing as well as scanning function working reliably) as a shared device, but not impossible. This point requires much more research and may be helped by consulting Apple's technical data (though even if a printer isn't listed, doesn't mean it won't work, but it DOES mean it MAY not work).

Utlimately, if you are indeed still using a Graphite Airport basestation, you might want to consider upgrading to a newer one, either new, or at a minimum an "Airport Extreme" DUAL Ethernet Snow round basestation.

The "Airport Extreme" Dual Ethernet Snow uses a much faster CPU, does 802.11g (slightly faster than the Graphite's 802.11b) and allows USB printer sharing (selected models as per usual).

A later or current model can also get you USB hard drive sharing but be careful, there are several models as can be seen from this list, and here

If you need to SCAN remotely (a pretty silly option IMHO) then a shared multifunction is more difficult to get working reliably. Far easier to share a printer only and attach a scanner directly to each Mac that needs one.
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Mercedes-Benz W164 history

 

[Intell]

If you have an older Graphite or grey coloured Airport, it will work, but due to the graphite Airport having a slow CPU and only 802.11b file sharing is a pain at best. If you're already doing this, then it should function the same way.

Difficult to support a multifunction printer (IE getting printing as well as scanning function working reliably) as a shared device, but not impossible. This point requires much more research and may be helped by consulting Apple's technical data (though even if a printer isn't listed, doesn't mean it won't work, but it DOES mean it MAY not work).

Utlimately, if you are indeed still using a Graphite Airport basestation, you might want to consider upgrading to a newer one, either new, or at a minimum an "Airport Extreme" DUAL Ethernet Snow round basestation.

The "Airport Extreme" Dual Ethernet Snow uses a much faster CPU, does 802.11g (slightly faster than the Graphite's 802.11b) and allows USB printer sharing (selected models as per usual).

There are two different models of round UFO shaped Airport base stations. The 802.11b speed and the G speed or Extreme ones. The first two where B. They where gray and a white one with a gray Apple logo. If the Apple logo is silver it is an Extreme one that can share a USB printer. You can still share files with either model but with a B one it will be slower due to the technology used. But I'm thinking that because you say you are having to use Airport Admin version 4.2 that you have the white B model. It does not have printer sharing capabilities.

You may also want to look into the older Airport Admin for Leopard and Tiger http://www.apple.com/downloads/maco...airportadminutilityforgraphiteandsnow425.html.

 

[MacTech68]

There are two different models of round UFO shaped Airport base stations. The 802.11b speed and the G speed or Extreme ones. The first two where B. They where gray and a white one with a gray Apple logo. If the Apple logo is silver it is an Extreme one that can share a USB printer. You can still share files with either model but with a B one it will be slower due to the technology used. But I'm thinking that because you say you are having to use Airport Admin version 4.2 that you have the white B model. It does not have printer sharing capabilities.

You may also want to look into the older Airport Admin for Leopard and Tiger http://www.apple.com/downloads/maco...airportadminutilityforgraphiteandsnow425.html.

Yup, this is why I specified the "Airport Extreme" version of the white round basestation.

Just to clarify, it must have "Airport Extreme" printed on it. In some images, it can be difficult to see the difference in the large Apple badge.

And

I've also discovered that Apple doesn't seem to list the early Airport Extreme (802.11n) SQUARE basestations that only have 10/100 ethernet in their Specs page and the only way I know of to tell them apart is from "Airport Utility"
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drug tests

 

[EmersonMitchell]

Success

I successfully upgraded my Mac Ibook G4 to OS X Leopard, and have successfully installed an HP Officejet 4500 wireless multifunction printer and tested all the functions. It needs an attached phone line for the Fax, but will communicate to everything on the Airport network

Experience: I needed the memory upgrade. I bought mine online from Crucial, recommended by Apple support. With my old trembling fingers I did not dare install it myself, but it is easy with the correct small screwdriver.

KNOW your passwords, I needed about 4 for various things to finish everything.

My old Airport is one of the round extreme ones, with a password. I recommend passwords on networks to avoid freeloaders and hackers.

Do call support lines and talk to humans. Computer help will do a lot, but not answer unanticipated questions. After checking the computer help so you do not waste their time.

I have not got the Ipad yet, Im holding out for Christmas and hoping Apple supplies support on the Ipad for video dialogs like Ichat etc on the Mac.

I do appreciate the responses I got.

This is the promised followup I mentioned in my original post.