What to use if you can't use airport extreme

[davidwes]

Hello. I have two macs. One is a bluberry G3 imac that can't use an airport card. The other is a lampshade g4 imac that does not have an airport card installed yet. I need to have both these computers using the interent but I don't know how to do that.

First off I know I can buy the base station with one wired port for 200 dollars, and then a used airport card off ebay for 150. It seems like a ton of money. Is there any other way?

I am currently used a cable modem, bothe computers are using 10. something.

 

[dpaanlka]

Hello. I have two macs. One is a bluberry G3 imac that can't use an airport card. The other is a lampshade g4 imac that does not have an airport card installed yet. I need to have both these computers using the interent but I don't know how to do that.

First off I know I can buy the base station with one wired port for 200 dollars, and then a used airport card off ebay for 150. It seems like a ton of money. Is there any other way?

I am currently used a cable modem, bothe computers are using 10. something.

You dont have to buy expensive Apple-branded networking products. Try LinkSys or Netgear or any of the hundreds of products available at Best Buy, Fry's, or any other large computer outlet.

 

[mrichmon]

First off I know I can buy the base station with one wired port for 200 dollars, and then a used airport card off ebay for 150. It seems like a ton of money. Is there any other way?

I am currently used a cable modem, bothe computers are using 10. something.

Assuming you can run ethernet cables to the computers you need a cable/dsl router. These come both with and without wireless connectivity -- if you plan on updating a a wifi ready computer then it is probably worth the extra few dollars for a wireless ready router.

The router will have one ethernet port that connects to your cable modem and usually 4 ethernet ports that can be used to connect computers into the home network you will be setting up. Personally, I've had a couple of linksys routers and never had any problems with using them with my OS X and Linux and Windows machines. If you go for a linksys router, the WRT54GL is a safe bet. Avoid the current WRT54GS routers the older version of this router is fine, but the new ones based on a VX kernel tend to be unstable.

Router + 2x 12' ethernet cables should come out to around $80 at most. Far cheaper than the solution you mentioned.