Two Airports, Two AppleTVs, Problems!

[Chaszmyr]

So I have run into quite a conundrum and I feel like I have tried everything, but maybe one of you is more clever than I am.

I have two Airport base stations, two AppleTVs, and a Mac Pro (which of course has two ethernet ports). What I want to do is have one Airport set to 802.11n only, to help with streaming HD video. I want all of my other wireless devices connected to the other Airport, set to 802.11g. Now the tricky part is one of those devices is the 2nd AppleTV, which I don't care if it's on 802.11g or 802.11n, but I want to be able to control it with the iPhone's Remote app.

The problem is the iPhone doesn't have 802.11n, so they can't both be connected to the 802.11n router. However, if I have the two airports "daisy chained" the AppleTV will only connect if its the one directly connected to my computer, but if the iPhone is then connected to the other one the Remote app doesnt work.

On the other hand, if I connect both Airports to the two different ethernet ports on the Mac Pro, both AppleTVs will connect to the network just fine and all should be good, except iTunes doesn't seem to be willing to identify one of the AppleTVs if I do this.

Any ideas?

 

[FX120]

You need to disable DHCP and NAT on the second airport, and assign it a fixed IP address in the same range as your other airports DHCP range (IE 192.168.0.3 if the rest of your network is 192.168.0.100-200), and hook it up to the other one using a LAN port on the back, and not the WAN port.

By doing this, you're disabliing the routing functions of the second airport, and making it into a AP only, allowing devices connected to the second airport to see the entire network, and not just devices attached to the second airport.

 

[Chaszmyr]

Thank you so much! I should have posted here a week ago!

 

[skorpien]

You need to disable DHCP and NAT on the second airport, and assign it a fixed IP address in the same range as your other airports DHCP range (IE 192.168.0.3 if the rest of your network is 192.168.0.100-200), and hook it up to the other one using a LAN port on the back, and not the WAN port.

By doing this, you're disabliing the routing functions of the second airport, and making it into a AP only, allowing devices connected to the second airport to see the entire network, and not just devices attached to the second airport.

Actually, you'll need to connect one of the first AirPort's LAN ports to the second AirPort's WAN port and disable DHCP on the second unit. To do this, you'll need to go into AirPort Utility > Manual Setup > Internet > Internet Connection and set the Connection Sharing to "Off (Bridge Mode)". Make sure the two SSIDs are different and the settings for Radio Mode in the AirPort > Wireless tab are set accordingly; ie 802.11n only (5 GHz) etc.

The instructions provided by FX120 will work on any non-AirPort routers (as is the case with my Linksys WRT54GS), but will NOT work for any AirPort Base Stations.

 

[Chaszmyr]

The instructions provided by FX120 will work on any non-AirPort routers (as is the case with my Linksys WRT54GS), but will NOT work for any AirPort Base Stations.

As my previous post indicated, FX120's suggestion actually did work, but it is quite possible that yours would also work.

What timing though? Apple just released a new Airport base station that would do what I need with only one base station.

 

[skorpien]

My apologies. I was under the impression that it would not work at all. I suppose the only advantage to the solution I provided would be that you don't have to tie up that additional LAN port. Not sure if the WAN port on the secondary base station would revert to a LAN port though...

And you're telling me! I'm running a dual band setup with a TC and Linksys, and this update would cut down on the clutter by quite a bit! I guess I can't fault Apple at all, but I wish I'd known so that I could have held up on buying my TC when I did...