Using a Wireless Airport Connection to Provide Wired & WiFi

Unfortunately, what you are trying to accomplish will not work with either the AirPort Extreme (AEBS) or the Time Capsule (TC). Instead, you would need an AirPort Express (AX) for this.

That is, because neither the AEBS or TC can perform as a wireless Ethernet bridge.

As Tesserax has already mentioned, neither an AirPort Extreme nor a Time Capsule can connect wirelessly to a third party network.

IF....you have an AirPort Express.....it does have a special feature that will allow it to connect to a Wi-Fi network and provide an Ethernet signal to another device.

There are two Ethernet ports on the A1392 version of the AirPort Express, which could be used to connect two Ethernet devices. If you need more Ethernet connections, you could simply connect a 5-Port or 8-Port Ethernet switch to the AirPort Express to provide additional Ethernet ports.

Just to clarify......if you are looking for a travel router......a single AirPort Express is not going to help you. All that an Express can do is connect to a wireless network using a wireless connection and provide an Ethernet signal at the ports.

Now, if you have 2 AirPort Expresses, you could use the first to connect to the wireless network and then connect an Ethernet cable to the second AirPort Express (or an AirPort Extreme or Time Capsule) and set it up as a router.

That's two separate AirPorts each performing a different function. Not a simple solution, but it will work.

FWIW, I use a TP-Link AC750 portable travel router for this exact purpose.

You get it directly from TP-Link or you can get it from Amazon for under $40 USD

Searchcz wrote:

I wonder how this is going to handle a captive portal situation?

Once your travel router is connected to the Captive Portal network, you will need to authenticate.

To do so:

1. Open the router's admin interface (typically by navigating to an IP address like 192.168.0.1 in your web browser).
2. Navigate to the WAN settings or the section where you can see connected networks.
3. Some travel routers allow you to interact directly with the Captive Portal login page. If yours does, enter your credentials here. If not, connect a device to either the travel router’s Wi-Fi network or available Ethernet port.
4. Open a web browser; you should be redirected to the Captive Portal login page once more. Complete the authentication here.
5. Finally, after authenticating, your travel router should now be able to share the Internet connection. Go back to the travel router’s admin interface and ensure the router is configured to share the connection via its Wi-Fi network.