Q: Multiple Airport Extreme Bases in 25,000sq location
I have installed (with initial support from Apple) 17 Airport Extreme Base locations in a massive estate to cover seamless wireless internet from corner to corner coverage. After the install (with 1 initial base, the others were extended), they started to fail one by one. Obviously when the primary base loses internet they all will. So I decided to hard wire a few of them and call Apple for more support. This time Apple stuck with their word that "only 3 units in a chain are supported and we cannot help you with any other". Although someone in engineering helped me when I planned this installation and said they had 14 at one location and would help if we needed. Bottom line they are no longer available and im stuck with a network that drops 75% of the time with use of 5 mins or more per device. Although every device does connect, they fail.. I have since removed from 17 to stations to 12 and have 4 hard wire units that have 3 wireless units on each and I am STILL losing the internet. I have a business strength ISP connection and the traffic is light. My questions are:
1 - Is the primary Base taking too much traffic?
a - If so, to relieve some should I add a switch to disperse some bandwidth?
2 - Any idea's to fix what I have or add any additional devices to make this network more stable?
Thank you in advance!
Brian
Airport Extreme Base Station
Posted on Jul 25, 2016 8:56 AM
I just wanted to add my resolution. With the help of you two I was able to combine the information you provided and make a solid work around.
I bought an 8 port Gigabit un-managed switch and put it right after the modem and before the first Airport Extreme. Then I took every unit that was hard wired and moved them to the switch. I then put 3 or 4 of the wireless units as a secondary to the wired unit then made them all as new networks but with the same SSID. I have had no issue since and the strength is even better.
Thank you again for everything!
Brian
Posted on Aug 1, 2016 6:54 AM