[drainyoo]

Can someone please recommend me a good router that is support for the mac? I current have a Linksys router hooked up to my cable modem and my Airport Express into the router. Everyone now and then I just lose connection. Then I restart the AE and the light is green but I get no service. After about 30 min of me turning my AE, Router and Modem on and off I get it to work again.

Im done with LinkSys. I go on there site and no mention of any Mac support.

So does anyone know of a good router?

Thanks.

[ghporter]

Originally posted by drainyoo:
Im done with LinkSys. I go on there site and no mention of any Mac support.

Actually there are fairly few router manufacturers that go out of their way to provide Mac support, and you pay a premium for their products. Besides, the only "Mac specific" support anyone really needs is instruction on how to get to the settings that might need adjustment. You can get that here for free.

There's probably something going on that you haven't seen, and it's quite possible you can fix it without spending any more money on new hardware. To identify what's going on, I need to know more about your situation.

What have you tried in examining your problem? Do you retain a wireless connection through the AirPort Express, even if you don't have an Internet connection? Which router model do you have, and what firmware version is it running? Is there anything else connected to the router? What devices are plugged into what ports on the router?

[drainyoo]

Originally posted by ghporter:
Actually there are fairly few router manufacturers that go out of their way to provide Mac support, and you pay a premium for their products. Besides, the only "Mac specific" support anyone really needs is instruction on how to get to the settings that might need adjustment. You can get that here for free.

There's probably something going on that you haven't seen, and it's quite possible you can fix it without spending any more money on new hardware. To identify what's going on, I need to know more about your situation.

What have you tried in examining your problem? Do you retain a wireless connection through the AirPort Express, even if you don't have an Internet connection? Which router model do you have, and what firmware version is it running? Is there anything else connected to the router? What devices are plugged into what ports on the router?

Ok Ill try and answer what I can.

Yes I do retain wireless connection through the AE even if I dont have internet connection. This lead me to believe that there is a problem with the router.

I have 2 machines connected to the router. One is a laptop that connects through the AE and the other is an old iMac directly connected with a cable.

I have model number BEFSR41. Not sure what firmware. How do I checked that?

Also, another problem Im having recently is that I cant get both machines to connect at the same time. I get one to work and the other stops working. Also when I finally get one connected and working, if I unplug it or turn the router on and off I loose all connection.

Also, on the iMac, when its not working, I check the Network Status in the sys prefs and it reads something like, your are connected to through ethernet blah blah blah, but instead of the indication being green its yellow.

I also read that Asante routers work well with Mac. And by Mac Support I just mean have some documentation and downloads for the Mac. Linksys never mentions a mac anywhere.

Thanks for your help.

[typoon]

Originally posted by drainyoo:
Can someone please recommend me a good router that is support for the mac? I current have a Linksys router hooked up to my cable modem and my Airport Express into the router. Everyone now and then I just lose connection. Then I restart the AE and the light is green but I get no service. After about 30 min of me turning my AE, Router and Modem on and off I get it to work again.

Im done with LinkSys. I go on there site and no mention of any Mac support.

So does anyone know of a good router?

Thanks.

Why Not get an Airport Extreme? It has Excellent Mac Support and can be hooked up to your cable modem. It will also work great with yoru Airport Express.

[drainyoo]

Originally posted by typoon:
Why Not get an Airport Extreme? It has Excellent Mac Support and can be hooked up to your cable modem. It will also work great with yoru Airport Express.

But its not a router right? I need to connect 2 machines and a PS2 to my modem.

[typoon]

Originally posted by drainyoo:
But its not a router right? I need to connect 2 machines and a PS2 to my modem.

You can use it as such. You would need to get a hub and connect it to the LAN port.

Unless your machines are wireless.

[drainyoo]

Originally posted by typoon:
You can use it as such. You would need to get a hub and connect it to the LAN port.

Unless your machines are wireless.

This made me think of another question. Do I need a router? What exactly is the purpose of a router? Cant I just use a hub to share my connection on a number of machines?

[Wiskedjak]

Originally posted by typoon:
Why Not get an Airport Extreme? It has Excellent Mac Support and can be hooked up to your cable modem. It will also work great with yoru Airport Express.

And you get to pay 2-5x more for it than any other router on the market ... woot

[typoon]

Originally posted by Wiskedjak:
And you get to pay 2-5x more for it than any other router on the market ... woot

That maybe so but he was asking for something with good Mac Support. So I suggested one.

[dreilly1]

Originally posted by drainyoo:
This made me think of another question. Do I need a router? What exactly is the purpose of a router? Cant I just use a hub to share my connection on a number of machines?

A router shared the single IP address you get from the cable company among the multiple computers in your house. It also sits between your cable modem and your computers, acting as a dumb firewall to keep the nasties out.

Your AEx can act as a "router" -- sharing a single connection among your computers -- but it can't sit between your cable modem and your wired computers since it only has one ethernet port. (Well, theoretically it could, but it's complicated).

Here's the thing, though: devices like routers, hubs, and wireless access points all deal with Ethernet in one form or another, and that protocol is largely platform-agnostic. So it shouldn't really matter whether you have a Mac or a PC, or both, or Linus, or a Sun Ultra 60 -- especially now that most of these devices (Apple's being the notable exception) have a web-based configuration screen, then the concept of support for one platform vs. another is kind of moot: all platforms get configured the same way, via the Web Interface.

So, I wouldn't get too upset with LinkSys over a percieved lack of Mac support -- if their device fails, it's not because you need Mac support, it's because the device is broke!

[drainyoo]

Originally posted by dreilly1:
A router shared the single IP address you get from the cable company among the multiple computers in your house. It also sits between your cable modem and your computers, acting as a dumb firewall to keep the nasties out.

Your AEx can act as a "router" -- sharing a single connection among your computers -- but it can't sit between your cable modem and your wired computers since it only has one ethernet port. (Well, theoretically it could, but it's complicated).

Here's the thing, though: devices like routers, hubs, and wireless access points all deal with Ethernet in one form or another, and that protocol is largely platform-agnostic. So it shouldn't really matter whether you have a Mac or a PC, or both, or Linus, or a Sun Ultra 60 -- especially now that most of these devices (Apple's being the notable exception) have a web-based configuration screen, then the concept of support for one platform vs. another is kind of moot: all platforms get configured the same way, via the Web Interface.

So, I wouldn't get too upset with LinkSys over a percieved lack of Mac support -- if their device fails, it's not because you need Mac support, it's because the device is broke!

It could possible be broke. I really have had no issues with my Linksys until now and when I went on their site to try and update the firmware, it really pissed me off to no end to see that they had NO Mac support what so ever.

Anyways, does anyone know what this problem could be? Do I maybe just need to reset the router?

[ghporter]

Since your AirPort Express still stays connected with your laptop, we can indeed consider this to be a router problem. And you say that you have problems having one computer knocked off when the other one connects. That sounds very much like either the router has failed, or that there's a LAN IP address conflict.

This conflict could come from two issues, but I think I've figured out the whole thing. I will bet that your AX is configured as it was out of the box. What you need to do is open the AirPort Admin Utility and go to the Network tab. Uncheck the "Distribute IP Addresses" box.

Here's what I think the trouble is. Your AirPort Extreme may be trying to provide you with its own automatically assigned IP address. This will be a 10.0.1.X IP. The problem is that your Linksys router defaults to an IP range of 192.168.1.X-completely incompatible with the AX's addresses. By unchecking the "Distribute" box, you're switching the Extreme to simply provide a wireless connection, and no longer perform any router functions like providing DHCP address and so on.

[drainyoo]

Originally posted by ghporter:
Since your AirPort Express still stays connected with your laptop, we can indeed consider this to be a router problem. And you say that you have problems having one computer knocked off when the other one connects. That sounds very much like either the router has failed, or that there's a LAN IP address conflict.

This conflict could come from two issues, but I think I've figured out the whole thing. I will bet that your AX is configured as it was out of the box. What you need to do is open the AirPort Admin Utility and go to the Network tab. Uncheck the "Distribute IP Addresses" box.

Here's what I think the trouble is. Your AirPort Extreme may be trying to provide you with its own automatically assigned IP address. This will be a 10.0.1.X IP. The problem is that your Linksys router defaults to an IP range of 192.168.1.X-completely incompatible with the AX's addresses. By unchecking the "Distribute" box, you're switching the Extreme to simply provide a wireless connection, and no longer perform any router functions like providing DHCP address and so on.

Very interesting but what about the computer that is directly connected to the router? It has the exact same problems my computer that is connected to the AE is having.

[drainyoo]

I went out and bought an Asante router. Everything is working just fine.

Thanks again for everyone help.

[ghporter]

Originally posted by drainyoo:
Very interesting but what about the computer that is directly connected to the router? It has the exact same problems my computer that is connected to the AE is having.

I would think that there was a conflict between the AE and the wired computer in their IP addresses. However, since you got an Asanté router and all is now well, your problem is behind you, it doesn't really matter.

[MichaelSullivan]

this belkin router has mac support, and costs $118. I just purchased one.

http://reviews.cnet.com/Belkin_Wirel...2.html?tag=top