[X4U] wireless network

[Allan Hise]

On Wed, 15 Sep 2004, [WINDOWS-1252] Donna Ellis=95Mitchell Senft wrote:

> Once again, we're close to getting broadband at home and have a couple
> of questions. It's going to be a cable modem. The main machine is an
> aged G4/400. The second machine, which needs to be able to access the
> web would be, preferably, an iBook G3/800 or one of the first
> generation iMacs.

OK, it sounds straightforward.

>
> First, I'm still unclear what plugs into what: cable modem goes into
> base station, and Mac connects to modem? Or base station? (The deal
> with Cablevision includes free installation, but I'm sure they're
> Macphobic so I'll have to know more than the installation person.)

When they do the install, I would be leery about letting them install any
software. I'll admit my inexperience with cable setups (I'm using DSL),
but I don't think you should need any additional software to make it work.
I would get it working with a wired ethernet connection to your G4, and
once that works, insert the wireless element.

As far as connections, the broadband signal comes into the cable modem and
from there you should have an ethernet port. Plug your basestation into
that, mking sure to use the appropriate port if it has more than one (on
my mother-in-law's Linksys wireless router, it is marked "Internet". I've
seen another router mark it "WAN").

If all other computers are wireless, then no more physical connections are
needed. If you have a mix, you need to plug in the wired computers to the
basestation, possibly insterting a switch or hub between if there are more
computers than ports on the basestation. BTW, generally switches are more
desirable, though more expensive (but not much so these days).

>
> After parsing Apple's support pages, I'm completely confused as to what
> hardware I need. Can I use Airport Express? Can either the iBook or
> iMac take a wireless card? If so, which card. It looks from the support
> page that at least the iBook can only take the original Airport card.
> Is that so?

The iBook is of similar vintage as mine, and yes, it only accepts a
non-Extreme Airpirt card. I don't know whether the G4 or the 1st gen iMac
have Airport slots at all, but they probably aren't "extreme". No matter,
they can be hooked up via ethernet easily or a 3rd party WLAN card/USB
dongle can be added if they need to be wireless.

I hope this helps.

Allan