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jeffton

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 12, 2008
2
0
Hi All,
I'm new to mac's, I bought a g4 (gigabit ethernet) running 10.3 off a friend when my ancient pc exploded.
I quite like the mac so im going to keep it for browsing and music etc, I would like to be able to connect it to my existing wireless network.
I have a 3com 54g access point plugged into my router, I have looked at ways to connect to this without using an airport card but I've got a bit confused. Could someone please tell me if the following is true?

1. I could use any usb dongle which has os x drivers
2. I could get a pci card that uses the same broadcom chipset (seems hard to guarantee getting one of these) as the airport cards or a card with an RT2500 chipset ans use the ralinktech drivers?
3. Or could I just connect it via the ethernet port to any other wireless bridge/access point which would in turn connect to the access point which is plugged into my router? (this being the cheapest I can find http://www.buffalo-technology.com/products/wireless/wireless-g/wireless-g-wi-fi-gamers-access-point/ )

Thanks for any help!
 
What you want is a Linksys WMP54G PCI card. Just put it in, reboot, and you have AirPort Extreme! I think it only works in 10.2.6 or later.
 
You can purchase this driver and any of the cards on the list. It has worked for me before.

http://www.orangeware.com/endusers/wirelessformac.html

You search for a card that uses the broadcom chip. Then use a plist editior, such as Plistedit Pro which is free to try, to edit the io80211family.kext extension with its vendor and device id, this is what I did to use an Atheros card since new iMacs use an Atheros based airport card. If you can not find the ven and dev ids through google you would need to use a Windows PC to find them in device manager.

iMpathetic's card recommendation looks good though since it has the same ven and dev id's as the airport card. If iMpathetic would be good enough to tell you the version of card used since there are several revisions of that model and sometimes they change chips.

Here is a small list of Broadcom 43xx series cards
http://bcm43xx.berlios.de/?go=devices

Broadcom Wireless Tutorial



Kext Used
The kext used for this tutorial is the IO80211Family.kext. This kext needs to be put into /System/Library/Extensions/ if it is not already there.

Entering your device ID
  • Make a backup of IO80211Family.kext
  • Edit the .plist file
QUOTE
cd /System/Library/Extensions

sudo nano /IO80211Family.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleAirPortBrcm4311.kext/Contents/Info.plist
  • Once editing the plist navigate to the area where you see
QUOTE
<string>pci14e4,4311</string>
<string>pci14e4,4318</string>
<string>pci14e4,4320</string>
  • Add a line with dev id (in place of XXXX)
QUOTE
<string>pci14e4,XXXX</string>


Setting Permissions
  • Type these commands into terminal
QUOTE
sudo chown -R root:wheel /System/Library/Extensions

kextcache -k /System/Library/Extensions


Final touches (Optional)
  • edit the interface config in order to use the airport utility instead of istumbler.
QUOTE
sudo nano /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/NetworkInterfaces.plist
  • swap the en0 with en1 for that device.
  • Run disk util and repair perms
  • Please note that you may need to change the number to en2 if you have 2 onbaord pci lan cards.
Sometimes your network card is already configured as an airport device and you do not need to swap the en #
 
Thanks for the help guys. I've found the linksys card iMpathetic mentioned but have no way of knowing what version it is. It seems to be a bit of a lottery with these cards whether I will get the right chipset or not.
Would connecting the mac via ethernet to a wireless bridge work? Would this be relatively easy to set up?
 
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