[sleepr]

I have a Power Mac G5 and my daughter just purchased the Airport Extreme Base for her Mac Book Pro. My question is, do I purchase: Apple M8881LL/A AirPort Extreme Card? Is this the right one. I had heard that it might be unless my G5 was a late 05 model??? How would I determine that if it is so and I need some other card? Please advise. Thank you in advance!

[ibook_steve]

It probably doesn't even need a card. In the Network preferences, is Airport listed as an available interface?

If not, you need the Airport Extreme card. All G5s use it:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3024

Steve

[sleepr]

I checked the networks pref panel and the about this mac info and airport is definitely not installed! the preference panel networks is showing ethernet connected and internal modem not connected. Anyway, besides an airport extreme card, would I need to purchase an antenna also? Someone else mentioned it and asked if there was one on the back of my Mac???

[ibook_steve]

No. The antenna is built in to the computer. When you install an Airport card, you'll find a little cable for the antenna that plugs into the card. I don't know which G5 you have, but just follow the instructions when you get the card:

http://support.apple.com/kb/index?pa...airport%20card

Steve

[Doc Juansinn]

A bit late to this thread…

As far as I know, the G5 has a built-in cable for the Airport card but requires an external antenna. The white, t-shaped antenna was included with all new G5s regardless whether the G5 came with an installed Extreme card.

[sleepr]

Thanks for all the advice. I found the antenna hookup inside my Mac next to the airport card plug and after some fiddling with the airport utility, I am aup and running with my new airport extreme base station. I never found an exterior antenna either on my G5 or one to purchase. Anyway, maybe the close proximity of the base station to the G5 allows it to operate. Also, my daughter can access the network from her bedroom, so she's excited. Thank you for all of your advice and suggestions.

[turtle777]

How far away is your G5 from the Airport Extreme ?
You might get a faster connection via ethernet, depending on the speed of your ISP.

-t

[sleepr]

Thanks for the input. Actually the airport seems faster than the ethernet. But my new problem is that my HP 2410 Photosmart printer wont recognize the airport and print!! I downloaded some software "gutenprint" and it did work. I can print with the printer hooked up to the airport but none of the HP software will work now, i.e. hp utilities, scanner, etc. When I hook up the USB back to my mac directly, it still doesn't recognize it. Maybe it's time for a new printer. Any recommendations?

[turtle777]

For full printer support (scanning etc.), you need to be directly connected to the Mac.
I don't think any printers would allow scanning via Airport, but I could be wrong.

Re: airport faster than ethernet
Unless something is seriously screwed up with your OS, ethernet would be faster than airport. It might not be noticeable, though. Mainly, it depends how fast the ISP is. For anything > 10 Mb/sec you would probably see better results with ethernet.

-t

[Simon]

Re: AP faster than Ethernet you could be seeing some DNS issues. DNS resolution uses caching and in Leopard sometimes things get screwed up. Lots of posts about DNS issues. Changing the interface can resolve that. Just like switching to OpenDNS IPs also helps sometimes. Maybe your AP connection feels faster because you were experiencing DNS issues with your Ethernet connection before.

If your Airport feels faster (DNS trouble usually translates to bad 'response time') than your Ethernet you might want to try using OpenDNS IPs (208.67.222.222, 208.67.220.220) for you Ethernet connection. It should then feel as fast as Airport. If not, it's not DNS trouble.

Could of course also be a damaged/bad Ethernet cable.