Does OS X 10.3.9 support WPA2?

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Level 1

6 points

Does OS X 10.3.9 support WPA2?

I have an Airport Extreme wireless network. It works fine with my MacBook and HP Photosmart printer. I also have an older PowerMac G4 Cube that connects fine via ethernet cable. However, I wanted to connect the Cube wirelessly, so I bought and installed an AirPort card. System Preferences-Network tells me that "AirPort is turned on but is not connected to a network." The AirPort Wireless symbol in the MenuBar shows no signal strength. When I attempt to select and join my network, I am asked for a WEP password. However, the OK button is grayed out and won't accept any input in the Password line. When I ask to "join Other Network" and enter the network password (I know the password to be correct as I am using it on my MacBook) either under the WEP or WPA2 security protocols, I am told that: "The wireless network does not support the requested encryption method." I fiddled with the antenna cable connection to the AirPort card, but that made no difference. I've been trying to upgrade the system on the Cube to Tiger, but can't seem to accomplish that using an external DVD drive. Any idea if the AirPort card can work with Panther, or if I am simply out of luck until I can manage the OS upgrade to Tiger?

MacBook, Mac OS X (10.3.x)

Posted on May 7, 2011 5:12 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

William-Boyd-Jr

Level 6

10,578 points

May 11, 2011 8:30 PM in response to olsenljo

According to the electronic book "Take Control of Your 802.11n AirPort Network" (http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/airport-n), "Macs running Mac OS X 10.3 Panther or later" can use WPA/WPA2 security. That said, I'm not sure what else to suggest to fix your problem.

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Answer 2

olsenljo Author

Level 1

6 points

Jun 14, 2011 10:02 AM in response to William-Boyd-Jr

Been a while since I looked at this. Thanks for your response. I bought and installed an internal DVD drive for the Cube. Also upgraded from Panther to Tiger 10.4.11, but the limitation appears to be with my AirPort card or it's software or firmware; not with the system software. The Cube can't join my wireless system. When I try to join, I'm asked for the WEP password and not given an option to ask for a WPA/WPA2 password which the Airport Extreme wireless system currently requires. Any ideas?

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Answer 3

Tesserax

Level 10

148,405 points

Jun 14, 2011 1:51 PM in response to olsenljo

It is important to understand the WEP, WPA, & WPA2 are standards not encryption protocols. Both WEP & WPA use TKIP for this protocol. WPA2 introduced AES/CCMP.

When you configure the AirPort base station for "WPA/WPA2 Personal," it means that it will accept clients that can work with TKIP. On the other hand, if you configure it for "WPA2 Personal," only clients that support the stronger AES/CCMP protocol will be able to connect.

To go back to your question, the minimum OS X version for TKIP is from 10.0+; for AES/CCMP, the minimum is 10.3.3+. In addition, for AES/CCMP is not supported with the original 802.11b AirPort Card, but is with the 802.11b/g AirPort Extreme Card.

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Answer 4

olsenljo Author

Level 1

6 points

Jun 16, 2011 8:32 AM in response to Tesserax

Thanks. Only information I can find for my AirPort card — short of pulling the CPU again — is that it has Firmware 9.52. I reconfigured Airport Extreme with a WEP password and got the Cube connected. Should be OK at my current residence.

While playing around, I tried to update the AirPort card firmware and ran into the following Catch-22:

Downloaded AirPort 2.0.2 and got: [AirPort cannot be installed on this computer. Installer Update is required for this update.]

Downloaded Installer Update 1.0 and got: [You cannot install Installer Update on this volume. This volume does not need Installer Update.]

Since I am up and running with the WEP password, I don't need to resolve this Catch-22, but if anyone has any insights to share, I am curious as to what is going on.

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Answer 5

Tesserax

Level 10

148,405 points

Jun 16, 2011 9:46 AM in response to olsenljo

As you may imagine, any vendor will have a difficult time maintaining older versions of hardware and or software. Actually, most don't and leave it up to the user to be "creative." In this case, I believe, you are in the same conundrum as a user with a Snow Leopard Mac trying to administer a 802.11b Dual Ethernet (Snow) or Graphite router ... they can't because the software to do so, will not run under Snow Leopard.

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Answer 6

olsenljo Author

Level 1

6 points

Jun 17, 2011 10:04 AM in response to Tesserax

Thanks.

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