[mr_sandin]

I have just bought a 3Com wireless router/gateway that handles the 802.11 b/g standards.

It also supports WPA, which I want to use in my network, and this is where the problems arise.

I have a iBook G4 with a built in airport extreme card. I have Panther with the latest software updates (for WPA etc.).

My 3Com router works perfectly fine running WPA with my girlfriends PC running Win XP. So the problem must be in OS X/Airport Extreme.

Has anyone succeeded with WPA, Airport Extreme (tha card) and a third party wireless router/gateway???

I have no problem getting my Airport card to run unencrypted, or with WEP, but I really want to use WPA since it provides su much better security than WEP.

My problem arises when i shall configure OS X to run Airport with WPA. I click on the airport icon (in the menubar) and choose 'other' (directly translated from swedish... don't know if it matches the english version of OS X). I then choose my network called '3Com' and WPA Personal. Then the only thing left to fill in is the password. I believe that this is where I shall put the 256-bit WPA key (as configured in my router). 256-bit in hex -> 64 characters. BUT OS X will only accept 63 characters in this field!!!!

I have tried everything possible, but I can't find out what I'm doing wrong. Please help me if you have have experience with WPA.

Thanks.

[oscar]

set up your router to broadcast in WPA, then try to connect in osx, then enter your password, viola!

[mr_sandin]

Originally posted by oscar:
set up your router to broadcast in WPA, then try to connect in osx, then enter your password, viola!

Broadcast what? Do you mean SSID? That shouldn't make any difference i believe. I have tried with SSID broadcast both on/off. No difference.

The thing I can choose in the router config is to use "manual pre shared key" or "pre shared passphrase". The "pre shared passphrase" generates a key from from a password. Is that what I should enter in OS X? (the password, and NOT the key?)


To everyone:
Have you got WPA up running? Please tell me your configuration... and exactly how you did it. (even if we don't have the same router)

[oscar]

I have a setup screen on my router that gives me this option:

[mr_sandin]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by oscar:
[B]I have a setup screen on my router that gives me this option:

...

Ok. But how do you configure OS X to connect to your router?
In OS X i can just choose between WPA Personal, and WPA Enterprise.
I choose WPA Personal.
I then enter my networkname (SSID) and after that I'm supposed to enter a "password". The problem is that the field only allows for 63 characters, and a 256bit key is 64 characters.

I cannot choose the type of key to input... :-/

[Mr Scruff]

I was setting up a WPA-PSK (personal) network yesterday.

I just had to enter a single password for the router, which I then had to enter on the mac. The only stipulation for the password was 8+ character alphanumeric.

I don't know what this 64 character key stuff has to do with WPA-PSK.

[mr_sandin]

Originally posted by Mr Scruff:
I was setting up a WPA-PSK (personal) network yesterday.

I just had to enter a single password for the router, which I then had to enter on the mac. The only stipulation for the password was 8+ character alphanumeric.

I don't know what this 64 character key stuff has to do with WPA-PSK.

What router did you use?

Can you explain how (step by step, I'm new to OS X) you configured WPA in OS X?

[mr_sandin]

Yihaaa!

It works! I was almost too simple.
It seems like OS X ONLY accepts WPA-keys based on a passphrase, and it is that passphrase that should be used as the key. Of course a passphrase is easier to remember, but it does not offer the same security as a random generated WPA-key(unless you choose a LONG passphrase).

It will be problem though, if I want to connect to a friends wireless network with WPA, if his accesspoint uses raw WPA-keys instead of the passphrase-based WPA-keys...

If you have any experiences with WPA and OS X, please post them.

[Fastguy]

I just got a d-link di-624 wireless router and I was attempting to use a WPA-PSK, but I don't really know if it was working or not. When I set the option, I used a password I wanted and I was able to connect to my network, but I always got some error message every time I logged in manually. If I set it to connect automatically to my network, the error message never popped up.

If I'm using the WPA-PSK and using a simple password (macintosh for example), is my network more secure than using a 128 bit WEP hex key and MAC filtering?

It just seemed like it was too simple since all the WEP keys require long, impossible to remember passwords and the regular WPA has all these boxes about radius servers and other tech jargon that I'm clueles about.

[mr_sandin]

Originally posted by Fastguy:
I just got a d-link di-624 wireless router and I was attempting to use a WPA-PSK, but I don't really know if it was working or not. When I set the option, I used a password I wanted and I was able to connect to my network, but I always got some error message every time I logged in manually. If I set it to connect automatically to my network, the error message never popped up.

If I'm using the WPA-PSK and using a simple password (macintosh for example), is my network more secure than using a 128 bit WEP hex key and MAC filtering?

It just seemed like it was too simple since all the WEP keys require long, impossible to remember passwords and the regular WPA has all these boxes about radius servers and other tech jargon that I'm clueles about.

Your network will be much more secure if you use WPA-PSK. Just make sure you choose a GOOD passphrase. A good passphrase in this case, is probable one you cannot remember, at LEAST 12 character or more, uppercase, lowercase and digits... in a good mix.

You can of course still use MAC-filtering with WPA. Another good tip is to switch off SSID-broadcast, so that your router doesn't tell everyone: "here I am" all the time.