Wireless recommendations

[jayducharme]

What are some recommendations for wireless n routers? I currently have a NetGear WPN2000 and it's a pain in the butt. My MacPro accesses it through its Airport Express card, and nearly every day I get the error message, "Airport has a self-assigned IP address and cannot connect to the Internet." If I reset the router, everything then usually works okay for about a day or two. I'm getting sick of resetting the router. I have an iMac and a printer attached to the router's ethernet jacks, and those work okay but seem pretty sluggish.

So I was looking into the Airport Extreme Base Station. On Apple's website, there are a lot of really negative reviews. So I'm hesitant to spend that much money on something that might not work.

So what do you think? Airport or Linksys or D-Link or ... what?

 

[fieldy au]

my airport extreme was a piece of cake to set up and connects my Macbook, PC, XBox360, Wii, PS3and Apple TV with 0 problems, I could ask for it to work any better..

It looks to me that people generally have problems when they set up the network incorrectly, now im a muppet when it comes to doing these things so if I can do it then pretty much anyone can..

 

[frankblundt]

I've had no issues with Airport.

You have to bear in mind how many people have it, and the percentage of those people that are complaining (quite possibly entirely justifiably) about it. People who don't have an issue generally don't feel the need to say so (you could say the same thing about many of the posts here). Books yes, CDs yes, wireless routers? really?

And that goes double for Apple stuff. People expect it to work and are not surprised when it does and horrified when it doesn't. Windows on the other hand..

 

[skorpien]

There will always be negative reviews. The truth of the matter is you won't be able to impress everybody (and this is especially true with Apple).

That being said, looking through the first few pages of reviews I see more positive reviews than negative ones. And having a Time Capsule (yes, not technically an AEBS but pretty damn close), I can tell you that setup and compatibility are top notch. I've a PS3, Wii, iPhone, 2 XP comps, 2 Vista comps, an MBP and an MB connected with no issues at all.

In fact, the only complaint I have is that the USB port doesn't support scanning or fax for multi-function printers, but seeing as yours is a true network printer connected via ethernet you have nothing to worry about.

 

[Michael CM1]

Personally, I like the AEBS way more than anything else out there. I liked my 802.11b Linksys router, but they totally Fed up the 802.11g with that setup wizard horse manure. I had problems a while ago with my AEBS, but that was fixed with a firmware update. It's ridiculous how easily it all works now. I have three HDDs shared over the network, which is why I bought the extreme. If you just need a wireless access point, you can probably get away with the express.

 

[Michael CM1]

There will always be negative reviews. The truth of the matter is you won't be able to impress everybody (and this is especially true with Apple).

That being said, looking through the first few pages of reviews I see more positive reviews than negative ones. And having a Time Capsule (yes, not technically an AEBS but pretty damn close), I can tell you that setup and compatibility are top notch. I've a PS3, Wii, iPhone, 2 XP comps, 2 Vista comps, an MBP and an MB connected with no issues at all.

In fact, the only complaint I have is that the USB port doesn't support scanning or fax for multi-function printers, but seeing as yours is a true network printer connected via ethernet you have nothing to worry about.

I agree with you about the negative reviews and the USB port. But I think the USB port thing may be getting negated as a lot of printers for sale now have WiFi. I haven't read up much on these, but if you can scan something hooked up via WiFi, AWESOME.

 

[coopermac]

I've had no issues with Airport.

You have to bear in mind how many people have it, and the percentage of those people that are complaining (quite possibly entirely justifiably) about it. People who don't have an issue generally don't feel the need to say so (you could say the same thing about many of the posts here). Books yes, CDs yes, wireless routers? really?

And that goes double for Apple stuff. People expect it to work and are not surprised when it does and horrified when it doesn't. Windows on the other hand..

I agree, I visit forums like this to glean information and to post if I have a problem. I am not an IT expert and have set up all my kit from scratch by reading the information on sites like this and the documentation supplied with products.

I had a wireless g network (Netgear DG834GT) running windows only gear until 18 months ago when I purchased my first Apple computer product, a MBP. I quickly became hooked on Apple products and now also have a MacMini, Time Capsule, Airport express and ATV. I upgraded the MBP's airport card myself to N and now run both a g and an n only network serving the two macs, two windows laptops and a linux desktop. Also connected is a printer and hifi for airtunes to the Express and a network drive to the Netgear. Visitors also occasionally connect windows laptops and an iPhone. All work well together and I would and do recommend Apple kit to others.

Of course there is no doubt that non Apple kit is OK too but for me Apple kit works so seamlessly with other Apple kit that it's a pleasure to use it.

 

[Fishermanbb]

Well i can share my experience as it is so recent. Yesterday I received my CTO MBP and got it all hooked up to the monitor and updated. Our old wireless system was a Linksys G and worked fine in our house with one extender.

We have a combination of MAC's and PC's in the house along with XBOX. The PC's are all "G" and the MAC's are all "N" capable. I didn't want to slow the MAC's down by using a mixed network and several machines use hardwire.

SOOO.....I got a Time Capsule AND an AEBS. I set the TC up in my office and set up an "N" only network at 5 Mgz. I then tethered that via ethernet to another room (Wife's office) and hooked the AEBS to it and set it up as a separate network at 2.4 Ghz. "B/G" only.

Both she and I have hardwire in our offices and my son hardwires his computer upstairs. The entire house gets both signals and the speed is incredible.....It was a piece of cake to set up and the entire process took me less than an hour....And I have NEVER used anything MAC before.....I also have a networked printer.......Everything works flawlessly and was too easy......

 

[EB66]

well i can tell you if you are using a mac i think the ease of use of the airport extreme is definitely worth it and i have not had one problem so far with it

 

[jayducharme]

Thanks for all of your advice. I went and got the Airport Extreme today. As most of you said, the setup was a snap. But I did find some confusing points in the installation. Setup detected the settings of my old router, but there was no way to delete those old settings. And Setup seemed to keep getting confused about which profile to accept. The setup process kept restarting. But I just quit Setup the second time through and everything seems to be working fine now. So far, the speed improvement compared with my NetGear router is impressive. So I'll keep my fingers crossed.

 

[harry454]

Congrats, hope it goes well for you