Airport Extreme turned into a brick

I have an Apple AirPort Extreme 802.11ac Wi-fi router. It has been working properly for a long time. But recently something went wrong: the yellow LED started blinking, but Airport Utility did not show any errors. I unplugged the power plug ⏤ This usually worked and the LED turned green again.

But now it just stopped giving out wi-fi completely. None of my devices can see the network, the LED on the router keeps blinking yellow.

At the same time, the router does not respond to attempts to reset it. I've tried everything ⏤ pressed the button for 1 second, for 5 seconds, pressed while plugging in, pressed for 30 seconds ⏤ nothing happens.

Has anyone encountered such a problem? Any tips on how to fix it?

AirPort Extreme

Posted on Oct 15, 2024 5:41 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Oct 15, 2024 5:56 AM

Not sure how much time that you want to spend on an AirPort Extreme that likely has experienced a power supply hardware problem.


Temporarily, connect an Ethernet cable from your Mac to one of the three LAN Ethernet ports on the AirPort Extreme. If your Mac does not have an Ethernet port, you will need a USB-C to Ethernet adapter.'


Open AirPort Utility


If the AirPort Extreme appears, click on the picture of the AirPort and a small window will appear with info about the AirPort Extreme


Click on the amber dot next to Status to see what error message the AirPort is reporting and post back with that information.

5 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Oct 15, 2024 5:56 AM in response to NightOWL4000

Not sure how much time that you want to spend on an AirPort Extreme that likely has experienced a power supply hardware problem.


Temporarily, connect an Ethernet cable from your Mac to one of the three LAN Ethernet ports on the AirPort Extreme. If your Mac does not have an Ethernet port, you will need a USB-C to Ethernet adapter.'


Open AirPort Utility


If the AirPort Extreme appears, click on the picture of the AirPort and a small window will appear with info about the AirPort Extreme


Click on the amber dot next to Status to see what error message the AirPort is reporting and post back with that information.

Oct 15, 2024 6:55 AM in response to NightOWL4000

The problem is that none of my devices have Ethernet ports.


That is why I mentioned that you might need an adapter.


Unfortunately, Apple will not service the AirPort Extreme even if you are willing to pay.


An independent shop might be able to find a new power supply board....(Apple does not sell this part).....but frankly if you want to stay with the AirPort, it would likely be significantly less expensive to look for a used AirPort Extreme on Ebay.


Even if the shop can find a power supply board, I imagine that labor would be a minimum of $150-175 for repairs. The AirPort was not really designed to be serviced.



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Airport Extreme turned into a brick

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