williamfromames

Q: Airport Utility v 6.3 Fails to See Airport Extreme or Express

After updating Airport Utility from 6.2 to 6.3, the utility no longer recognized either Airport Extreme base station or Airport Express.  Both of these devices are at firmware level 7.6.3 which is current.  The Airport Utility display showed the internet globe with a green indicator.  (Wireless internet was indeed working.)  Neither Airport device showed and the utility searched endlessly.

 

Apple support suggested trying a physical connection to the base station.  When the Airport Utility was directed to look through the ether hose rather than over the waves (menu, upper left corner of display screen), it found both devices immediately.  Apple support person determined my base station was manufactured in 2007 (serial number) and, though we did not check, I believe the Express was probably about a year later.  Returning to wireless access caused the devices to become invisible again,

 

An Apple support case number 454816175 has been opened dealing with the inability of Airport Utility 6.3 to recognize older Extreme and Express devices over the Wi-Fi interface.

 

I earlier posted by mistake a comment on this problem to a discussion regarding firmware levels.

MacBook Pro, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.4)

Posted on Jun 11, 2013 3:21 PM

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Q: Airport Utility v 6.3 Fails to See Airport Extreme or Express

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  • by Nirvana98109,

    Nirvana98109 Nirvana98109 Jun 18, 2013 12:46 PM in response to Rob Maurer
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Jun 18, 2013 12:46 PM in response to Rob Maurer

    It was off on my iMac because I turned it off. In general it's best to turn things off that you don't use for security. Apple obviously missed this in their testing. I'm sure they will deal with it in an update.

  • by Saskwach,

    Saskwach Saskwach Jun 18, 2013 10:31 PM in response to Rob Maurer
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 18, 2013 10:31 PM in response to Rob Maurer

    Hi Rob,

     

    The short answer to "why" IPv6 was set to Off can only be answered by the individual, or teams at Apple that develop and release Airport Utility patchs and upgrades. Most probably it was just an oversight.

     

    But Mac users are a resourceful bunch, and through forums, such as this one, we collaborate to make life better for all Mac users.

     

    The long answer: When the internet was concieved, a set of operating guidelines were developed to, among other things, specify how all the users and devices were going to be able to communicate. What they came up with was a system for assigning unique addresses for every user and device that is online called the Internet Protocol, version 4, or IPv4. At the time it was thought that approx 4 billion unique addresses would be more than enough. But it wasn't so Internet Protocol version 6, or IPv6 was developed which allows for adding some number of additional unique addresses that is so huge it can only be expressed using scientific notation. (For more details on the Internet Protocol, both Google and Wikipaedia have tons of detail on this.)

     

    How will this effect users like us?

     

    The most obvious change will be in the actual IP addresses used in every device we use online. Under IPv4, IP addresses are composed of 6 groups of two numbers each  (i.e. 09:89:00:01:67:55) but under IPv6 this is increased 8 groups of  four numbers (i.e. 1234:4321:0000:8989:5748:1234:4321:0000)

     

    For the time being, most internet service providers, gear manufacturers, etc. are still using IPv4 addresses.

    However, that is starting to change, and in the near future device manufacturers, like Apple, will most likely begin building new Airport Extremes, Apple TVs, etc that have the new IPv6 addresses, like what prompted this whole discussion. Also, you will start to see ads from your ISP, or Web hosting companies claiming they support  IPv6. As long as your home gear can handle both, which Apple's does, you won't really notice any difference (except , of course, when someone inadvertantly upgrades their software or hardware and forgets to make the default setting as "On," not "Off.")

  • by bobwild,

    bobwild bobwild Jun 19, 2013 4:07 AM in response to Saskwach
    Level 4 (1,633 points)
    Jun 19, 2013 4:07 AM in response to Saskwach

    I didnt see the problem with my macs and airports. I never turned IPv6 off on any of the devices, so I didnt lose communication between devices when they start using IPv6.

     

    One correction: IPv4 is 4 groups of 3 numbers. The numbers in each group range from 0 to 255, like so 172.16.254.1

     

  • by Jester68_Italy,

    Jester68_Italy Jester68_Italy Jun 20, 2013 1:01 PM in response to williamfromames
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 20, 2013 1:01 PM in response to williamfromames

    Can anyone check, after enabling IPv6, if iTunes Airplay connections take more time to be established?

     

    TIA

  • by Wizyrd,

    Wizyrd Wizyrd Jun 21, 2013 1:09 AM in response to williamfromames
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 21, 2013 1:09 AM in response to williamfromames

    I might have found a solution. 

     

    I had the same problem. I had updated the Airport utility from the program, and it failed, so I used Time Machine to revert to 6.2 with no problems. When I decided to try again when it popped up in the Update Utility (silly me, I thought they might have updated the update....), it STILL didn't find my Time Machine, but this time I could not restore the older version because  it was "needed by the system". Thank you Apple Update.


    However if I unplugged the ethernet cable from my laptop and gave it a minute, the utility found my Airport Extreme via WiFi and I was able to edit that way!

     

    Here's why it didn't work before, and here's the solution. When you're editing your settings, in the Base Station tab, check the box that says "Allow Setup over WAN"  and apply the settings. It will warn you that it is less secure (hey, it was never a problem BEFORE) and tell it to ignore the problem. Then give it a couple of minutes to settle in. The next time you plug in your ethernet cable, everything should work just fine again.

     

    Still can't delete 6.3, but hey, now I don't need to!

  • by Brian Dodds,

    Brian Dodds Brian Dodds Jun 21, 2013 9:59 AM in response to Wizyrd
    Level 3 (711 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Jun 21, 2013 9:59 AM in response to Wizyrd

    I found that my IPv6 was turned off. 

    As soon as I set it back to Automattic the Airport showes up again.  

  • by Falcon-007,

    Falcon-007 Falcon-007 Jun 21, 2013 8:05 PM in response to Brian Dodds
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 21, 2013 8:05 PM in response to Brian Dodds

    I have a similar issue. At start-up, my iMac recognizes my new Extreme (5th generation) no problem.  I am connected via ethernet and wifi is turned off.  After my iMac sleeps, it will no longer recognize the Extreme. The whole wifi and ethernet network works fine but the iMac won't recognize the Extreme.  After a reboot, all is fine until the next time it sleeps.  I tried all the IPv6 settings mentioned above.  Any ideas??

  • by Falcon-007,

    Falcon-007 Falcon-007 Jun 21, 2013 8:28 PM in response to Jeff Leigh
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 21, 2013 8:28 PM in response to Jeff Leigh

    I have a similar issue. At start-up, my iMac recognizes my new Extreme (5th generation) no problem.  I am connected via ethernet and wifi is turned off.  After my iMac sleeps, it will no longer recognize the Extreme. The whole wifi and ethernet network works fine but the iMac won't recognize the Extreme.  After a reboot, all is fine until the next time it sleeps.  I tried all the IPv6 settings mentioned above.  Is there some auto-connect feature I'm overlooking?  Any ideas??

  • by doelle,

    doelle doelle Jun 25, 2013 12:17 AM in response to Jeff Leigh
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 25, 2013 12:17 AM in response to Jeff Leigh

    Thank you Jeff. You solved my problem. Going crazy after update to 6.3 I could not se my Airport base. But now after checking my IPV6 it works. Hurra from Denmark.

  • by BevL,

    BevL BevL Jun 27, 2013 8:40 AM in response to Jeff Leigh
    Level 1 (34 points)
    Mac OS X
    Jun 27, 2013 8:40 AM in response to Jeff Leigh

    Thanks for the directions.  This worked for me as well.  I was able to see my new airport extreme in airport utility on my computer originally to set it up but then it failed to show up.  Both my extreme and express showed up perfectly on my ipad.  So until this, I thought I would just settle for that.  However, I tried your suggestion on my MBP and it works perfectly.  I did have to restart my computer twice.  Once after the change and then again after connecting to wifi to be able to connect to sites.  Thanks again.

  • by DerekCan,

    DerekCan DerekCan Jul 15, 2013 9:57 AM in response to Jeff Leigh
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jul 15, 2013 9:57 AM in response to Jeff Leigh

    Thanks, that was the ticket.  As soon as I turned IPv6 back on, there was also an update for Airport (6.3.1) detected...too funny.

  • by jehuca,

    jehuca jehuca Aug 18, 2013 8:37 AM in response to Jeff Leigh
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 18, 2013 8:37 AM in response to Jeff Leigh

    This totally fixed my issue and I have bee struggling with this for a long time! Thanks so much.

  • by prigollet,

    prigollet prigollet Nov 5, 2013 1:44 AM in response to jehuca
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 5, 2013 1:44 AM in response to jehuca

    Read all these posts and it's not working for me.

    I've had automatic and tried local only on both ethernet and wifi to no effect.

     

    I can set up my airport Time capsule through an ipad, iphone and ancient macbook but not to my 3y old MBP upgraded to mavericks.

    I keep getting the unexpected error whether I try ethernet or wifi.

     

    When people talk about setting the IPv6 on the time capsule how would you go about doing this?

    thanks

    P

  • by jgoldstein001,

    jgoldstein001 jgoldstein001 Nov 9, 2013 8:29 PM in response to prigollet
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 9, 2013 8:29 PM in response to prigollet

    Not working for me.

     

    Airport express is hardwired over ethernet to my thunderbolt with MBP 2013 on Mavericks, airport 6.3.2,

     

    Still can't see base station under "other wifi devices' within airport utility on Thunderport Ethernet ?!?

     

    My network on my MBP is configured with IPV6 "Link-Local-Only" and so does my base station but still can't get it to work.

     

    Any help?

  • by prigollet,

    prigollet prigollet Nov 28, 2013 10:06 AM in response to jgoldstein001
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 28, 2013 10:06 AM in response to jgoldstein001

    Got it working.

    For me the solution was to do the hard reset whilst the ethernet cable was connected between my MBP and the airport time capsule.

     

    Once setup in the airport utility the airport time capsule shows up. hovering the mouse over shows a buble with some info that can be edited, although not obvious, if you ckick on the bubble.

     

    hope this helps some

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