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I've got 3 AE's in my home and in each location I'm short on Ethernet ports and wind up doing what you mentioned. I understand that a lot of people simply use them for wireless, but bridging to wired devices is pretty common as well.

I just use the one. Surely a simple bridge and/or switch would be far cheaper than another router?
 
I just use the one. Surely a simple bridge and/or switch would be far cheaper than another router?

They are distributed through the home, so they serve to improve performance in all rooms while bridging to wired devices in several locations.

No doubt that it could be done cheaper, but my experience with Apple's networking products is that I set them up and never touch them again. My experience with other networking products has been far less satisfactory.

When I don't need multiple ports, I use Airport Express. I have several of them as well.
 
I suppose if you'd want to put a hard drive in the AE you could drill a hole through the apple at the top and pull a SATA to USB adapter to the USB port on the back. Score: Apple - 0, Common man - 1.
 
I think Apple must have seen the light. The AppleTV 1 and 1st generation Time Capsule both had thermal problems for me. These new designs seem somewhat inspired by Seymour Cray's design philosophy.

"Cray frequently cited two important aspects to his design philosophy: remove heat, and ensure that all signals that are supposed to arrive somewhere at the same time do indeed arrive at the same time."

B

Excellent point. I think you're correct. Not just with the Extreme. My first views of the innards of the new MP screamed Cray. I just wish I could afford one. :apple:
 
Will it improve range and speed for non ac equipped macs more than the previous gen AE? I have a 2012 mbp. Not sure if it would benefit from it.
 
I'm thinking of picking up a new 3 TB Time Capsule to replace my previous-gen AirPort Extreme. A question for you: Did you simply export your configuration from the old one before disconnecting it, and then import the configuration into the new one once it was hooked up?

I have done exactly that moving from version to version of the previous Time Capsules, but I have not seen anybody with this new one post that they did it. I suspect it would work. I'll be able to tell you on Monday when my new TC shows up. :)
 
Jeez, people! Do you not READ? The tower design is to help with the antennas and the 802.11 AC performance. Stop whining and READ!

Apple could print in the instructions to ELEVATE the box for best reception and achieve the same effect with a smaller box and/or an optional stand. In other words, some of us have read and now choose to THINK! :cool:
 
I prefer the old design, but when my current AE dies I'll still buy one of these.
 
I have a 4 yr old Cisco valet plus for a few iPhones iPad and a 2012 cmbp. Not sure if my cmbp would benefit from this. We do stream a lot of movies from my mbp to our Apple TV which buffers at times. Would this help even though my 2012 cmbp isn't ac ready?
 
One reason why the new AirPort Extreme may only support USB2 is that USB3 causes pretty significant interference with 2.4GHz wireless devices (WiFi, Bluetooth, etc.). Apparently this is a serious enough issue that Intel has even written a white paper on this problem.

The website SmallNetBuilder also noted that in their test of the latest D-Link 802.11ac router that when you enable USB3 capability on that device the D-Link firmware gives you the following warning: "Please note that enabling USB 3.0 may adversely affect your 2.4 G wireless range."

In fact, D-Link only advertises USB2 support even though their hardware is USB3 capable (if user enabled via firmware). SmallNetBuilder also tested the hard drive access with and without USB3 enabled and they found that USB3 only added about 4MB/s to the file transfer speeds. Even with USB3 enabled the transfers topped out between 12 and 27MB/s which is easily within the range of USB2.

One can conclude, therefore, that in terms of wireless access the lack of USB3 support in the new AirPort Extreme is a non-issue (in fact, it may be a good thing if you need to use the 2.4GHz band for WiFi).

The only remaining issue might be what if you don't need 2.4GHz support and you want to access the USB drive over a wired network (1Gb ethernet)? In that case you might GUESS that USB3 would help but given that the total throughput on any device is finite it might not make much of a difference there either (given the chipset, firmware, etc.).
 
One reason why the new AirPort Extreme may only support USB2 is that USB3 causes pretty significant interference with 2.4GHz wireless devices (WiFi, Bluetooth, etc.). Apparently this is a serious enough issue that Intel has even written a white paper on this problem.

The website SmallNetBuilder also noted that in their test of the latest D-Link 802.11ac router that when you enable USB3 capability on that device the D-Link firmware gives you the following warning: "Please note that enabling USB 3.0 may adversely affect your 2.4 G wireless range."

In fact, D-Link only advertises USB2 support even though their hardware is USB3 capable (if user enabled via firmware). SmallNetBuilder also tested the hard drive access with and without USB3 enabled and they found that USB3 only added about 4MB/s to the file transfer speeds. Even with USB3 enabled the transfers topped out between 12 and 27MB/s which is easily within the range of USB2.

One can conclude, therefore, that in terms of wireless access the lack of USB3 support in the new AirPort Extreme is a non-issue (in fact, it may be a good thing if you need to use the 2.4GHz band for WiFi).

The only remaining issue might be what if you don't need 2.4GHz support and you want to access the USB drive over a wired network (1Gb ethernet)? In that case you might GUESS that USB3 would help but given that the total throughput on any device is finite it might not make much of a difference there either (given the chipset, firmware, etc.).
But when Apple doesn't include USB 3, it's the biggest sin in the world and "they do this just because they want to throttle you now and sell you a faster one next year" - typical macrumors trolls :D


Back to the topic, having read the report about speed and reception improvement on 802.11n equipped MacBooks, it seems that it may be good for me to upgrade from my 2009 AEBS!
 
I've heard these don't work with PC's anymore, in fact even the Manual is void of any PC reference. It appears these now only work with Macs - anyone else peeved - here's the Manual - http://manuals.info.apple.com/en_US/airport_extreme_80211ac_setup.pdf
I highly doubt they don't work with PCs, a wireless client is a wireless client

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Apple could print in the instructions to ELEVATE the box for best reception and achieve the same effect with a smaller box and/or an optional stand. In other words, some of us have read and now choose to THINK! :cool:
I don't think you've thought much about Apple if you had it in your head that they would ever do something like this
 
I highly doubt they don't work with PCs, a wireless client is a wireless client

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I don't think you've thought much about Apple if you had it in your head that they would ever do something like this

My Airport Extreme + external harddisk set up has always worked for all of my Macs and PCs since it uses WiFi and file sharing (SMB) standards.

I think the 2TB Time Capsule is quite attractive since the price is similar or cheaper than an Airport Extreme + external 2TB 3.5" HDD setup. But the 3TB Time Capsule is too expensive.
 
...which has nothing to do w/ the people complaining about the new design, does it? my previous Extreme has a hard time reaching the bathroom & kitchen in the back of the house, or the backyard.

hahah. 5 years...good one.

Actually my current Extreme has already lasted 4 years, so it lasting 3-5 years isn't that outlandish!

Then don't buy it. Why do you care, if you don't need it? <shaking head>

So you've never commented on anything in MacRumors forums that you haven't bought or needed?

SMH.
 
I ordered mine and it is stuck at FedEx awaiting customs clearance release as it isn't in the system yet. Hope apple gets on the ball and gets the info to them quickly.
 
To all those that think a router needs USB 3 - check what the actual transfer rate of a hard drive is - it will come nowhere close to saturating USB 2, let alone USB 3.

Unless you're connecting an SSD to this - but what would be the point of that?!?
 
I really wanted to go Apple with my next router but this thing is seriously lacking in software features. QoS and VPN Server to be precise. I was really hoping to see a nice user friendly version of both of these in an Apple router. Instead, it's pretty basic as far as software features compared to what others in this arena are offering. I'll have to bite the bullet and get an Asus router.

Qos and VPN?
I be happy if i can add static routes rather then have to NAT for traffic to come back. I have multiple LANs behind the extreme.
 
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