How to set-up a DUAL BAND wireless network.

Thanks for the replies Glyn.

I have all 3 g/b basestations set to bridged mode and have WDS setup as you describe. I feel like I understand this relatively well, but it's still not working.

Any other ideas? Is there any reason that this should be any different than using the AEBS(g/b) as my DHCP server and building the network off of it? I'd prefer to use the AEBSn as the main basestation, but perhaps I should try it the other way.

Thanks again.

At this point my G network is all torn up and not really working anyway. Plus I'd like the N to be the boss.

Not really sure where to go from here. Maybe I should try going back to having the G/B basestation as the boss. That or I guess I might need to call Apple support.

Glyn,

Random question: What device/product are you using as your Media Server? How did you set it up?

Thanks for all of the usefull information.


Andrew

Hello again! Just wanted to let you know that I was able to the network up and running just as hoped. I now have the AEBS as the master and the DLink up as the Slave. I was able to get the XP machines back on the DLink and they now show the original connection speed of 108 again. I'm wondering though, I have a printer connected on the USB on the AEBS and would like to print wirelessly from all the laptops. It works perfect from the Macbook Pro, but I Bonjour doesn't pick it up on the machines connected to the DLink. Any idea why? Am I doing something wrong or is this possible with the current configuration? Either way, thanks again for your help and this thread!

:^) Teresa

Glen,

Wondering if you had any problems sharing when you change your network over to have the N network as the boss. I have a macmini that I can no longer get to. I use to be able to use command K or even use no-ip.com.

Now no matter what I do I get this error msg:

The server may not exist or it is not operational at this time. Check the server name or IP address and try again.

any ideas

Glyn,

I followed your Inst and now I can connect using command K to the local IP address, but when I use like no-ip.com with a different port that I setup forwarding I get this error msg:

The server may not exist or it is not operational at this time. Check the server name or IP address and try again.

Now the mac mini goes into a gigbit hub, the hub is plug into the 802.11n extreme. I have the same old port number before I change over to have the 802.11n being the Boss router, and the other extreme is in bridge mode.

Have or do you connect from outside of your network? I just want to be able to see the macmini HD from outside my local network again.

thanks for the help

Hi Glyn,
I just purchased my airport extreme 802.11n base station and will proceed to follow your diagram. I will be getting a new macbook with "n" and have an apple tv to install both of which I want to connect to the new extreme base station. I will leave all my existing devices airport express, tivos, VOIP, and soundbridge to communicate with my Netgear G wireless router.
One question if you don't mind.
My PowerMac G5, which is not wireless, but will have all my itunes, movies content, etc.....which router should I wire it to?
I would appreciate your help and am sorry if I didn't see a simiar set up in the thread.
Thank you,
Steve

For various reasons I wanted to set up a dual band network, but with the AEBS (g/b) first in the chain, with the AEBS(n/g/b) last. I have linked the two airports with ethernet cable and the network worked fine at first. Then after about 2 days the Airdisk dropped off the network, first to my old iBook, then to the iMac FP. These two macs were connected to different AEBS and now only the iMac DV, which is ethernet linked to the n model AEBS can see the airdisk. The error message is "Connection failed Unknown user, incorrect password, or login is incorrect. Please retype the login information or contact the disk's administrator."

I have changed and checked the password (I can acccess both Airports via the Airport Utility) that makes no difference. I would like to get this working as I am about to hang a printer off this connection too (Via a powered hub).

A final aside, I stopped using the airdisk to share my iphoto library because it was too slow, would an ethernet enclosure hanging off the AEBS(n) automatically show up the way the airdisk used to and would this be quicker than the Airdisk.



Lloyd

Hello Glyn. I would like to use the same setup that you show at the beginning of this thread. However I have one more step. My Airport Extreme (g) LAN port is connected to a Linksys Gigabit 8 port ethernet hub. So I cannot connect my older g Airport to the newer N Airport directly, since the older g Airport LAN is already in use. Do I simply connect the WAN port from the new N Airport to an ethernet port on my Linksys hub.

Thank you for your help,

George

Glyn & et.al,

I'm relatively new to the forums & essentially an amatuer at configuring systems, but was looking for some help. I have searched around a bit & found quite a few threads in which you or 'Tesserac' seem to have a good understanding of how to set things up. I've also been trying to find a few answers, and while some of my issues are mentioned in other threads, it's only in passing - so I apologize if these questions should start another thread. Questions 1&2 may not be directly related, but I think you could help w/#3.

Q#1 - security - when running an Airport base station in bridge mode, are you restricted to WEP level of security or can you still use WPA & WPA2? I've read in other forums but cannot confirm that in bridge mode you are restricted to WEP.

Q#2 - security - when running an Airport Express as part of a WDS, are you restricted to WEP security?

Why this is important - I live in an area filled with multiple networks - I'm looking at setting up two networks, a b/g network for printer sharing and Air tunes to multiple USB speakers as well as an old Powerbook & friends w/b&g laptops, as well as a separate 'n' network for a new/on order iMac & an Apple TV. Would like as high a level of security as possible. Am also looking a eventually running Airtunes through some speakers in the garage which is quite far away.

Q#3 - transfer speeds - Did you notice a drop in speed when you changed from sharing the internet connection via the AEBS(b/g) to sharing the internet connection via the AEBS(n)? I've read elsewhere that there is a hit on speed when using Internet sharing via the WAN.

http://www.macintouch.com/reviews/airportn/
In our testing, AirPort Extreme provides outstanding 802.11n performance through its LAN ports. However, when using Internet Sharing (also known as NAT, or Network Address Translation, mode), throughput via the WAN uplink port drops considerably. We observed a maximum speed of 34 Mbit/sec. in this configuration. While this is faster than a typical cable modem or DSL line, it's considerably slower than a switched 100 Mbit Fast Ethernet connection.

Also,
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=4285079&#4285079

Have you or others seen this to be true/if so would your original set up be quicker?

Why this is important: one could set up a separate 'n' network just for file transfers btwn 'n' clients - iMac & Apple TV & ethernet linked media server, and btwn a new Macbook Pro (that has more power for transcoding files than the iMac) and the iMac. While it would restrict the Macbook Pro to b/g speeds while browsing the net, that is not as big an issues - the bottleneck @ this time is the ISP.

Q#4 - Hardware/transfer speeds in the network - what would be faster - an external HD firewired to a client vs. an ethernet linked media server?

It seems that some of you have played with both - right now I have my iTunes library on an external firewired WD HD and I use SuperDuper for smart backups to an identical external HD. However, I'm approaching 500 GB of media files and was wondering should I just continue to buy larger Firewire drives vs. invest in a ethernet enabledHD/media server. If so, what are good options - this has been asked before, but no real answers/everything I have found on the web appears to be based on Windows Server

Q#5: Signal str
2003.

iMac G5 + Macbook Mac OS X (10.4.7)
iMac G5 + Macbook Mac OS X (10.4.7)