kamui Posted January 11, 2009 Report Share Posted January 11, 2009 Of course there are routers featuring Draft N that cost less than 100$.But I have to admit that the airport extreme does have a bunch of features that aren't usually all in one and therefore justify the price. Gbit LAN, Draft N and an USB port that not only enables networking for a printer but also enables networking for an external harddrive. Unfortunately only one of both at a time. Also OH will have less headaches when his Draft N devices are from the from the same brand, otherwise there might be compatibily problems. Only I think OH needs a simple router that offers four LAN ports (100 Mbit) and wireless Lan 11g (54 Mbit) which will be less than 50$. Lots of offers for routers up to 50$ which will most likely do the job. Nevertheless I would recommend an Apple router. Especially since OH never has set up an home network. Apple products are *much* easier to setup in any case and especially in installing a network. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carlton68 Posted January 11, 2009 Report Share Posted January 11, 2009 Actually I have set up many routers and I never found it to be difficult. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Weird Posted January 11, 2009 Report Share Posted January 11, 2009 In terms of setting up a home network with windows XP and higher. It's basically plug and play now. Setting up a home network in the past with Windows used to be a time consuming process. One of my friends who had never set it up before purchased the parts, and just followed the instructions as they were displayed on the screen(for the wireless, just choosing which network to connect to). He had his PC wired in and his wireless pc in another room connected to the internet within 10 minutes. This with a wireless linksys g/n router. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Hippie Posted January 11, 2009 Author Report Share Posted January 11, 2009 The Desktop is a PC, running XP, The laptop is MAC. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manaomaiminam Posted January 12, 2009 Report Share Posted January 12, 2009 The price is driven up by the additional features. Take the normal G/N spec and add gigabit lan feature on a basic $50 cisco/linksys and you are over $100, usually about $129, add the USB drop and you make up the rest of the money difference. If you don't already have a printer, buy a network-ready printer (whenever you need one) and you can connect off one of the LAN ports saving the USB for NAS (shared network disk storage). After you install, make sure that you protect access to your wireless access. It will protect you from people like me "borrowing your network access since I am too cheap to get my own." Honestly, I only do that from my apartment in BKK. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Hippie Posted January 13, 2009 Author Report Share Posted January 13, 2009 in terms of symplicity, it looks like the Airport Extreme is going to do it. Someone mentioned Protecting my signal" to make sure no one uses it or hacks into my system...ah how? or is that in the package already? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manaomaiminam Posted January 13, 2009 Report Share Posted January 13, 2009 I am not familiar with the Airport Extreme, but all other switch/routers I have worked at has it built into the package (though it is not the default). I assume it is the same with Airport. Check your documentation and turn it on. It is usually password-based and you only have to pass it once. Your laptop and the switch should then synch automatically each time you connect. For an intruder, like me, when I search for a network, I will find a secure network, and should I want to log on, it will prompt me for a userid/password or password only. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carlton68 Posted January 13, 2009 Report Share Posted January 13, 2009 The signal uses encryption, levels are 'open', WEP, WPA and WAP2. With WPA2 being the strongest encryption. Both router and client must support the encryption method, then you're ready to go. Built in all new routers and adapters (like your macbook). As said before, read the manual how to do it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kamui Posted January 13, 2009 Report Share Posted January 13, 2009 in terms of symplicity, it looks like the Airport Extreme is going to do it. Someone mentioned Protecting my signal" to make sure no one uses it or hacks into my system...ah how? or is that in the package already? The ease of use (besides the superior design) combined with built in security (no need for an additional firewall and antivirus scanner - yet) is the reason why I switched to Mac. If I remember right, ecryption (WPA2) is already switched on in the airport and your Macbook will recognize it automatically - while I our IBM notebooks always need to be told all ecryption details like WEP/WPA2, key lengths e.g., very annoying when you are traveling. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Hippie Posted January 14, 2009 Author Report Share Posted January 14, 2009 As long as it works with my PC (Ancient as it is) and Mac, I am cool with it...should be my project for next weekend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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