[Mallrat]

I'm about to buy an airport b card for my ibook 500.

If I do, which base station should I get. I think the current ones are backwards compatible with the original airport card.

But I still can't decide or tell the difference between the 180 base station and the portable 129 airport express.

they both seem to do the same thing, expect the airport express can hook up to a stereo and it's cheaper.

I asked in another post, but I can't figure out what I'm missing.

All I want to do is surf the internet and it would be cool to print out to my printer. I guess playing iTunes wirelessly would be sweet.

I guess my question is, any reason to get the more expensive base station?

[wataru]

Unless you need to attach a 3rd party antenna, or you need the dialup feature, there is no reason to get the Airport Extreme Base Station over the Airport Express. But if all you want is a wireless router, there are many, much cheaper alternatives out there. Look at Netgear, Linksys, etc.

By the way, there is no thing as "Airport b." "Airport" is synonymous with 802.11b, the older, slower WiFi standard. "Airport Extreme" is 802.11g, which is faster but also backwards-compatible.