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macintologist · May 9, 2006, 02:24 AM

I have an intel iMac connected to the net via Ethernet. I have Internet sharing enabled and I set it to share over Airport so my iMac is esentially an airport base station. It works wonderfully with my Powerbook and normally I use password encryption.

However PC's can never connect to it. Yes, I did try taking the encryption off and making it just a wide open wifi hotspot, but still, no Windows PC can connect to it. Is there anything I can do to make it work out?

macintologist · Oct 25, 2006, 02:21 AM

Bump because I'm still having this problem.

ghporter · Oct 25, 2006, 06:59 AM

By "connected to the net via Ethernet" what do you mean exactly? Cable? DSL? Fiber direct to the home?

And why go to all this trouble with Internet Connection Sharing when you could spend a few bucks and get a wireless router that would do all this stuff for you without much hassle at all? Seriously, ICS is at best a short-term method; it's not built to do what you need to set up a robust and secure wireless network.

macintologist · Oct 25, 2006, 12:17 PM

But thats beside the point. I'm just curious as to why Macs can see my Internet Connection Sharing airport network perfectly but Windows can't.

IsaacW · Oct 25, 2006, 02:35 PM

I had a similiar problem this morning, except that I was able to connect a Windows PC when I turned off WEP. Neither the 64 bit or 128 bit encryption worked. Could this be related to the issues stemming from the 10.4.8 update?

Tuoder · Oct 25, 2006, 02:44 PM

I am pretty sure you have to turn on ICS (internet connection sharing) on the windows PC, as well.

seanc · Oct 25, 2006, 03:23 PM

Originally Posted by Tuoder

I am pretty sure you have to turn on ICS (internet connection sharing) on the windows PC, as well.

Why? The Windows PC isn't sharing anything, it's connecting to the Mac which is sharing the connection.

Tuoder · Oct 26, 2006, 08:34 AM

Originally Posted by seanc

Why? The Windows PC isn't sharing anything, it's connecting to the Mac which is sharing the connection.

I am having a hard time remembering how to do it. I had acomputer use dial up, then it used ICS to share over a 10Mbps ethernet connection. I am not sure if ICS has to be on on both machines, but it does take client configuration.

ghporter · Oct 26, 2006, 08:51 AM

ICS makes the computer running it (whichever platform it is) act like a router. You only have to run an ICS app on the computer that has the connection you're trying to share.

And ICS is still a very poor substitute for an inexpensive router.

macintologist · Oct 26, 2006, 04:33 PM

To make it clear, connecting a windows PC to my mac's ICS over ethernet or firewire works dandy. It's just the airport sharing that's borked, even with WEP turned off.