Use AirPort Extreme Just for home wifi networking

[jmcrutch]

I recently canceled my inbound home cable internet because my unlimited T-Mobile LTE on my iPhone is enough for me (I'm single).

I have an AirPort Extreme (with a USB Connected external HD), a MacBook Air, 2 Apple TVs, an iPad mini, and an iPhone 5. The iPhone 5 is the only device that is connected to the Internet.

Before I canceled my cable internet I had successfully maintained my iPhone on both the LTE network from t-Mobile (for Internet) and my home AirPort Extreme wifi (for networking to the other devices). i did this by deleting the router information in wifi settings on my iPhone but leaving the other wifi settings info intact (IP address, subnet mask, and DNS).

Well now that my cable intenet is gone I'm struggling to get everything to connect to each other. I've tried restarting all devices. I've tired setting up the AirPort Extreme anew. I've tried it in "bridge mode," etc but I can't get video to AirPlay from my iPhone to the AppleTVs. Likewise I can't get video on my MacBook air to AirPlay to the TVs wither. I can get Audio from pandora or iTunes to play but when I try AirPlay YouTube or Netflix I get an error message. Same goes for video from the MacBook air. Over set the AppleTVs to NOT AirPlay from iCloud.

I know all about how some apps won't allow video airplay to AppleTVs (showtime for example) - this is NOT what I'm talking about. I'm talking about apps that should be able to video airplay to an AppleTV that will now not work as they used to.

Anyone have suggestions? Thanks!!

 

[jmcrutch]

The things I'm not positive about are:

On my AppleTVs should I set up their networks and choose the option to "connect to the network even though there's no internet"

On all my devices should there be DHCP settings in place just without the router information - or should it all just be blank?

Do I need to use "bridge mode" on the airport extreme?

Do the DNS settings need to be identical for every device that is connected to the Airport Extreme?

Is there a particular order in which I should set devices up and/or restart them?

 

[bubsdaddy]

Are you trying to use your iPhone to provide internet access to your other devices? Or are you just trying to maintain a home network without internet?

 

[jmcrutch]

Are you trying to use your iPhone to provide internet access to your other devices? Or are you just trying to maintain a home network without internet?

I'm just trying to set up the home wifi network (without an inbound internet connection). I just want to be able to file-share, and have all the apple devices connected to the same wi-fi network to enable full AirPlay capability from my iPhone and MacBookAir.

 

[bubsdaddy]

You may be overthinking it then. Just use airport utility to setup the network. You will get an error telling you you don't have internet access but click on it and ignore that error. You may want to reset the base station first using the small hole and a paperclip to do a hard reset. Then you can use your iphone or macbook to walk through the setup.

 

[jmcrutch]

I promise I'm not overthinking this ... I've tried everything i know.

Ive just now reset the Airport Extreme and set it up as a new network using the Airport Utility on my iPad mini. Then I connected the AppleTV to the new network and made sure that the router address was blanked out (basically setting a static IP), and did the same on my iPhone and iPad.

I just tried to AirPlay a netflix video from my phone to the AppleTV and it gave me an initial message on the phone that it was playing on my TV, then I saw on my TV the typical scrolling wheel that you see when a video is booting to AirPlay. But,,,,, it finally timed out and I got the following messages:

On my AppleTV: "An Error occurred loading this content. Try again later"
On my iPhone: Error. Cannot play movie. Please try again later. OK"

Same exact error messages if I try to AirPlay content from Hulu+ or YouTube to my AppleTv.

If i try to just AirPlay some music from my iPhone (iTunes library content, iTunes radio, rhapsody, pandora , etc) it will airplay just fine.

If I try to AirPlay a movie that is loaded on my MacBook air under this new setup, it will play just fine on the AppleTV.

Video podcasts that were already on my phone AirPlay just fine.

I'm also able to backup my MacBookAir to the Time Machine folder that is located on the HD attached to the Airport Extreme via USB.

Lastly, the homeshare function is working OK as I can load content from my computer's library on the AppleTV via the Computers app.

Before I canceled my internet I made sure that I could AirPlay video content from Hulu+, Netflix, and other streaming sources via my iPhone (using TMobile's LTE as the inbound source) to my TV via the home wi-fi network. The only thing that has changed really is I no longer have internet connected to the AirPort Extreme.

So there's something wonky now with trying to stream an HD video source over my LTE network then airplay it to my TV via the wifi. it used to work and now it won't. Sorta defeats the purpose of my canceling the home internet now if I can't make use of the LTE to airplay TV shows and movies to my TVs.

 

[Altemose]

The things I'm not positive about are:

On my AppleTVs should I set up their networks and choose the option to "connect to the network even though there's no internet"

On all my devices should there be DHCP settings in place just without the router information - or should it all just be blank?

Do I need to use "bridge mode" on the airport extreme?

Do the DNS settings need to be identical for every device that is connected to the Airport Extreme?

Is there a particular order in which I should set devices up and/or restart them?

You can run the AirPort without an internet connection. However, you cannot use bridge mode and must leave it in DHCP and NAT mode. Bridge mode disables the DHCP server (router) in the Extreme and therefore all of the clients on your network cannot get an IPv4 address.

 

[jmcrutch]

Thanks. Although I've tried bridge mode in my attempts to get this to work, I am not using it right now.

All the devices see the AirPlay options but when I try to stream video to the AppleTVs from a streaming service it fails. I have 24Mb/s LTE internet on my phone so it's not the issue.

I've canceled out the router setting to 0 in most cases so the devices won't have an expectation that they can find the internet (although I've also tried it leading the router code in place too).

 

[Altemose]

Thanks. Although I've tried bridge mode in my attempts to get this to work, I am not using it right now.



All the devices see the AirPlay options but when I try to stream video to the AppleTVs from a streaming service it fails. I have 24Mb/s LTE internet on my phone so it's not the issue.



I've canceled out the router setting to 0 in most cases so the devices won't have an expectation that they can find the internet (although I've also tried it leading the router code in place too).

I have always just plugged in my modem and then disconnected it while ignoring the error.

 

[jmcrutch]

UPDATE:

I think the issue is there is some back-end iTunes store authorization that is being attempted, even though none of the content is coming from iTunes. If the AppleTV doesn't have an internet connection then the authorizations cannot occur, and you get the load failure.

The way I've gotten this to work for Netflix, is to sign on to my iPhone's hotspot wi-fi network from my AppleTV.

Doing so brings back the full AppleTV menu of apps and allows me to AirPlay. I still have "AirPlay from iOS device" set instead of "AirPlay from iCloud" to (hopefully) ensure that the my AppleTV receives the content ONLY VIA AirPlay (drawing the content through my LTE cellular connection) as opposed to from the AppleTV itself via the LTE hotspot connection - this may be splitting hairs, but I only have 5GB of hotspot per month, so I need the LTE data to be going to my iPhone and not my AppleTV directly.

For the record, I'm not using the AppleTV Netflix App to watch the show right now - I'm using the app on my iPhone and AirPlaying it to the AppleTV.

I'll be watching my Hotspot usage like a hawk to make sure it doesn't spike on T-Mobile.

 

[bubsdaddy]

Glad you "kind of" found an answer. It is very odd that you can stream music and local content over Airplay but not internet content. The fact that the local content plays indicates that your network setup is probably correct. Odd problem, my friend.

UPDATE:

I think the issue is there is some back-end iTunes store authorization that is being attempted, even though none of the content is coming from iTunes. If the AppleTV doesn't have an internet connection then the authorizations cannot occur, and you get the load failure.

The way I've gotten this to work for Netflix, is to sign on to my iPhone's hotspot wi-fi network from my AppleTV.

Doing so brings back the full AppleTV menu of apps and allows me to AirPlay. I still have "AirPlay from iOS device" set instead of "AirPlay from iCloud" to (hopefully) ensure that the my AppleTV receives the content ONLY VIA AirPlay (drawing the content through my LTE cellular connection) as opposed to from the AppleTV itself via the LTE hotspot connection - this may be splitting hairs, but I only have 5GB of hotspot per month, so I need the LTE data to be going to my iPhone and not my AppleTV directly.

For the record, I'm not using the AppleTV Netflix App to watch the show right now - I'm using the app on my iPhone and AirPlaying it to the AppleTV.

I'll be watching my Hotspot usage like a hawk to make sure it doesn't spike on T-Mobile.

 

[jmcrutch]

Yeah its strange that I could AirPlay (audio) streamed music content that was coming from my cell connection but not streamed video content unless the AppleTV was also using my iPhone's cell connection (I presume for authorization).

This may prove to be more hoops to jump through than I intended just to save $55 a month on cable internet.

 

[jmcrutch]

Looks like my hotspot usage is spiking so the AppleTV is drawing data somehow even though it's my iPhone that's streaming the content.

If I switch the AppleTV back to my home wifi (the one without an intent connection) I can still AirPlay streamed music from my phone (evidently the ApplrTV doesn't need to do any backend authorization for music streaming like it does for video).

I really didn't think that air playing would be considered hotspotting but I guess it is.

Also - at the moment if I have my appletv and MacBook air both connected to the home wi-fi I can AirPlay movies off my MacBook air (or select them from Computer's Library from the AppleTV) ... I am assuming that perhaps iTunes only checks periodically for authorization on content stored on the drive unlike streaming video content where it needs to authorize it immediately.

Still confused why my hotspot usage would go up if I've got "do not airplay from iCloud" selected in the AppleTV menu. Seems like it should just be using my data to being the content from Netflix's server to my iPhone and then it wouldn't matter that I'm airplaying it a TV.

If I usef a physical connection between the iPhone and te AppleTV I doubt this would happen