Creating a roaming AirPort network

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Level 1

132 points

Creating a roaming AirPort network

I have a current AirPort Extreme and an AirPort Express. Will I be able to create a roaming network, if both are behind the ISP gateway and connected through the same upstream network switch?

There is an Apple Support document entitled Wi-Fi base stations, Extending the range of your wireless network by adding additional Wi-Fi base stations, which discusses using multiple AirPort devices for creating a roaming network. All of the illustrations have the secondary AirPort directly plugged into the LAN side of the primary one. It is not clear to me, whether this is because the assumption is that the ISP gateway is the AirPort Extreme device, but that this isn’t necessary.

In my case, my AirPort Extreme is set up in bridge mode, as a LinkSys router running DD-WRT acts as the Internet gateway. Here is a diagram:

Will this work for roaming, or will the AirPort Express have to be downstream from the AirPort Extreme?

MacBook Pro, macOS Sierra (10.12.3), Early 2011

Posted on Feb 20, 2017 10:19 PM

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Answer 1

Feb 21, 2017 7:26 AM in response to D. Hoffmann

It will work fine.. there is no need for the express to plug into the airport extreme.

Let me suggest that both the Extreme and the Express will behave a lot better if they both have static IP addresses.. rather than just bridging them and then leaving them to change address upon the whim of the dhcp server. You can do it directly on the Airports or you can setup dhcp reservation in dd-wrt.

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Answer 2

D. Hoffmann Author

Level 1

132 points

Feb 28, 2017 10:41 PM in response to D. Hoffmann

For archival and documentary purposes, I am going to describe the steps I took to properly set up my AirPort Express.

With the AirPort Express reset to factory settings my AirPort Utility looked like this:

I then clicked on “Other Wi-Fi Devices (1)” in the upper left and selected the AirPort Express like so:

A new sheet appeared:

A short while later this changed to:

I just hit “Next.” “Other Options” would have produced this:

But, like I said, that’s not what I did. Next I saw setup progress:

When it was done, this was presented:

I hit “Done.”

And this is the final result. The point is, however, by choosing this setup method, the AirPort Express gets its settings from the AirPort Extreme automatically. I don’t know, what kind of apportioning of frequency channels takes place, but I assume that it does.

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Answer 3

Bob Timmons

Level 10

186,320 points

Feb 21, 2017 7:26 AM in response to D. Hoffmann

There is an Apple Support document entitled Wi-Fi base stations, Extending the range of your wireless network by adding additional Wi-Fi base stations, which discusses using multiple AirPort devices for creating a roaming network. All of the illustrations have the secondary AirPort directly plugged into the LAN side of the primary one

All of the illustrations in the document assume that you have a simple modem......not a modem/router or gateway type of device......which is what you have.

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Answer 4

Bob Timmons

Level 10

186,320 points

Mar 1, 2017 5:44 AM in response to D. Hoffmann

Your assumption is correct.

By default, the AirPort devices will scan wireless channels in use in the area and automatically choose the best available channel to use.

If for some reason you do not want this to occur, then you can manually select wireless channels for each AirPort for each 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands using AirPort Utility.

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Answer 5

D. Hoffmann Author

Level 1

132 points

Mar 20, 2017 1:59 PM in response to D. Hoffmann

Yesterday I had a great opportunity to prove to myself that the AirPort Express really is the slave to the master AirPort Extreme. I added the MAC address of my wife’s new iPhone 7 to the Timed Access Control list (in the Network tab), which I use to disallow any unknown host onto my network. After adding the iPhone to the Extreme, it showed up in the Express automatically.

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