I have a Powermac G3 MDD, with Leopard Server 10.5. I just got an airport card for it- one of the original 802.11 b cards. When I try to connect to my home's wireless network, I type in the WEP key, and after a few seconds the window says "Connection Failed."
My router is a D-Link wireless N router, but it should be backwards compatible.
Does anyone know how I can get it to connect? We have all PC's in my house except for this one, but my friend has connected his macbook to our network before, simply by typing in the password.
I'd really apreciate any help you can give. Thanks,
-TC
Powermac G4 MDD,
Mac OS X (10.5),
1.5 Gb, 80 gb HDD, 1.25 GHZ
The guide for WEP keys says to use 13 character key, but I specifically remember the router setup asking for a 10 character key. Could changing the password cause any other conflicts?
Be cautious about assuming how many characters are in a password based on the number of bullets.
For example, in many instances in Mac OS X, a fixed number of bullets are placed in the password field, regardless of the length of the password. Mac OS X generally has absolutely no way of knowing the length of the actual password.
It would substantially weaken the security of a password to give you a hint about how many characters are required.
I answered a post recently from someone who wanted to know why Mac OS X had changed their password. They entered a three character password and the system consistently changed it to eight characters -- they could tell because it put eight bullets in the password box. (If you know the length of the password, then my previous post was not directed at you.)
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Regardless of what the Router does to pad out the unused digits in shorter passwords (add Zeroes, add blanks, add hex FF) if you use all the alloted characters, there is no padding, and the full-size password is more likely to work in every circumstance.
I'm not sure if this will be helpful, since I'm in Canada, but with my home wireless network which is with Bell/Sympatico, I usually cannot connect with neither an airport nor an airport extreme card unless I've also entered in my user name (assigned by Sympatico) and password - as if I were going to connect with and ethernet cable. With other wireless networks that I might visit, I only have to do the usual Network Name and passphrase.
Now Bell does advertise their wireless as not being compatible with the mac, but I've been connecting with relatively no problems when using 10.3 or later. Granted, Bell are also lazy incompetent buffoons, and have no consistent solution for pretty well any problem that the people who pay for their services might have - but luckily their service usually works well inspite of the people who run it.
There also is a good chance that your airport card just isn't receiving the signal strongly enough - I have that problem in certain rooms with both powerbooks and desktops (am working right now with a G4 MDD running 10.5 and it can't consistently get a signal). Your router should be fine - I've set up a variety of D-Link Routers for wireless using my mac powerbook. A couple of times I've found it helpful to trash my network and keychain preferences for the wireless network.
You ISP may be using what "Bell" in the Boston area was using initially -- PPPoE. That requires a username and password to get on the network (not necessarily to connect to the Base Station/Router.
The best "fix" for that is to configure your Router for PPPoE on the Internet side, and enter the username and password in the Router configuration. Then when you connect your computer, the Router will make the connection, enter the username and password to the ISP automatically, and present you the illusion of the "always on" connection they claimed they were providing.
Yes, it is. And the router has been set up with PPPoE, but with Airported Macs, I still seem to need the user name, etc in addition to the wireless passphrase, to be sure. Without those Network will say I'm "connected to the network but lack an IP Address so cannot connect to the internet". It will sometimes let me connect in the standard wireless way, then the next time, maybe not - this seems to happen to others using Airport on the Bell/Sympatico network in Toronto, at least. Rather than argue, I just enter the whole deal and then I don't have to worry about it - when it is done that way, I just automatically connect and continue connecting without any problems. As I said, Bell will loudly claim their wireless network isn't compatible with Mac when asked for support, despite myself and others telling them how to make it work, so I just ignore them and do what works (and actually very well - rarely a dropped connection).
I'm interested in your choice of words here, "...and present you the illusion of the "always on" connection they claimed they were providing."
The "promise" of Broadband was that you would get an "always on" connection that you could use immediately on a whim. Many Bell Operating Companies, at least initially, decided instead to insert a PPPoE login into the mix. I believe they felt it gave them better control with less-complicated intervention. If you did not pay your bill, just shut off your userid -- no need to find the rack or the network address and pull the plug or cut off your port. It also allowed them to over-configure their networks, with more potential users than could always be accommodated. Users constantly connecting and disconnecting gave them the warm fuzzy feeling that all could be serviced, since it was more like dial-up.
Once you set up your Router for PPPoE, you can have the "always on" back again, because the Router takes care of the login. Sometimes, realizing "always on" requires your Router to send a "keep-alive" message to the ISP every few minutes, or they get timed out and disconnected.
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It is possible that your Router login may be distinct from your PPPoE login. Certain types of WPA encryption require both a username and a password.
Interestingly enough, in general, I've always found a PPPoE connection faster to a DHCP connection - whether wireless or ethernet cabled. Maybe it's because most of the dhcp places have been things like an university and have a lot of people connected - but the same with people I know who use Cable, also DHCP. I don't hardly ever get a dropped connection with Bell (which would make sense from your description of the service), whereas with dhcp, it seems a pretty regular occurence.
I've encountered all three of the connections in the document you've posted about airport. Sometimes the wireless signal from my landlord (three flights up) is stronger in certain areas of my place, so I connect to that (as he does with mine). For some reason he's only configured his with WEP (even though his macs and one peecee are newer than mine). My own G4 Titanium has a Buffalo pmcia card which is recognized as an airport extreme card instead of a standard airport card (I've been meaning to "doctor" it so I can install it internally into the airport slot, but have hesitated partially to time but also because I always get a stronger signal than even the macbook's and macbook pro's which have already an airport extreme card installed - seems the aluminum case isn't much better than the titanium at not blocking the signal), so I prefer to use WPA myself. So far the regular aiport cards that have connected seem to not have a problem with WPA although as the article suggested, they're running Panther or Tiger.
I started having network connections whether wired or wireless though, almost a year ago after doing the latest security update at the time on Tiger. Both my desktop and powerbook were affected. It turns out the network and keychain preferences had all got corrupted after the update. With the desktop, I started not being able to connect anymore - kept saying the ethernet cable was not connected, or my login authentication had failed. This of course me to try to re-ad the user name and password which led to even more confusion. I even thought that the ethernet port had died so I actually shopped for (and bought) an alternative hook-up card. Got similar error messages with the powerbook, with the wireless and the ethernet and since I already had problems with the ethernet port on the Titanium, it just fueled my belief that the ethernet on my Quicksilver had died also. However before I had received the new equipment, through reading here and through my own assesment of the symptomns, I tried trashing all of my network and keychain preferences and that fixed the problem on both machines.
Okay, so I changed my network to use WPA 2 encryption, instead of WEP, and changed my password also, but when I try to connect I still get the "Connection Failed" message. According to the article about WEP passwords, WPA avoids all those issues, so I don't think the problem is with passwords. I do not think their is a problem with the actual airport card either, because I have briefly managed to connect to unprotected networks in the area.
OK, now you need some more information or more assistance.
For more information, I suggest downloading a "stumbler" program (invented to help you stumble upon a wireless connection). The side effect of using one of these is that they show you how your base station is placed in relation to the others available from your laptop. Sometimes you discover three others on the same channel, and an unused channel nearby.
For more assistance, I recommend using the "assist me" button. It provides a "set-up wizard" to help you get your configuration right, and also a diagnostic to check that your network is behaving as expected.
It can also be run directly, or you can create an alias and/or add it to your Dock:
I used both MacStumbler and iStumbler, and they find between 2 and 3 networks, but all are on different channels. My home's network has about 90% signal strength, and 52% noise. I have already tried the Network Diagnostic tool, and after I type in the password to connect I get the message "Unable to join AriPort Network," and a few samples of what might be the problem.
I am not an expert on this facet of it. But I think 52 percent noise is really lousy, and I expect you would NOT be able to connect reliably with that much noise.
What are the noise numbers like on your neighbors' Routers that you CAN connect to?
