[swimfan]

Here's the situation.

I just bought some cheap 802.11b wireless products for my PC laptop and PC desktop to connect to my airport extreme base station.

Problem #1 -

Does anyone know how to use WEP encryption with PC's connected to an AEBS? I've tried everything, even making the password in "xxx" quotation marks, but that didn't help. I finally turned off the WEP security and the PC's connect without a problem.

Problem #2 -

My laptop connects and stays rock solid with no drops everywhere in the house. (much better reception from this 17 dollar PCMCIA card than my PB 12") my PC however sits only 8 feet away and through a wall from the AEBS. When I boot up the PC, it connects and shows a fluctuating connection of about 85% -100%. About a minute goes by and the connection gets dropped all together and it won't come back. It doesn't even detect a wireless network. Has anyone else delt with something similar to this? Please help.

Solution?

I've had so many problems with my AEBS that I'm thinking about selling it and buying a 3rd party wireless router.

[anthology123]

Had the same problem and the answer for mine was WEP encryption. Your wireless card has to support 128-bit, like the AEBS, in order to get into WEP. One way to have a secure access is to shut off WEP, but only let computers in based on hardware address. that should lock out most intruders.

[ghporter]

Go for the 3rd party wireless. AEBSs seem to be very finiky, and it's complex enough for most people just to get WEP working in a mixed (Mac and PC) network. Top it off with the fact that Apple decided to stay with the same paradigm for configuring the AEBS that they used with the original ABS-completely different from everybody else in the wireless networking market, and hard to configure to match other wireless products.

Maybe you could sell your AEBS to someone with all Macs; you may actually make a proffit off the deal by using the procedes to buy a 3rd party wireless router.