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Really Basic Airport Questions
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christ
Professional Poster
Join Date: Mar 2001
Location: Gosport
Status: Offline
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Feb 13, 2003, 08:00 AM
 
I have a 533DP, with an airport card, and a 667TiPB, with an airport card. (none of this extreme nonsense).

1) When I connect via airport in my 1930s brick built house (in the UK), the range is around 10 feet. Fine in the same room, fine through a stud (wood) wall or through the window, but zero through a brick wall (actually zero is not quite correct - I appear to have from half to full signal, but very limited data exchange - pings are possible but take forever to return, with 50%+ packet loss). Is this
(a) normal for all airport connections
(b) a function of the TiPB's crap range, and therfore
(c) if I were to get a base station would this 'fix' the problem, so I can get a range of 20-30 feet (so that I can connect the base station to a cable modem in a different room from the 533DP).

2) When the two machines are in the same room, and the airport network is fair whizzing along, How do I 'Internet share'?
(a) I have a 56k modem on the 533DP, is it possible to share this internet connection over airport? If so then
(b) how do I connect to the internet from the TiPB - what settings do I have to set? Do I have to give the IP address of the 533DP as a proxy, or what?

All help appreciated, as (as you may guess from the desperate tone of the stupid questions above) I have not got _clue one_ about this wireless magick.
Chris. T.

"... in 6 months if WMD are found, I hope all clear-thinking people who opposed the war will say "You're right, we were wrong -- good job". Similarly, if after 6 months no WMD are found, people who supported the war should say the same thing -- and move to impeach Mr. Bush." - moki, 04/16/03
     
swiftp
Junior Member
Join Date: Sep 2000
Location: Norwich, Norfolk, UK
Status: Offline
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Feb 13, 2003, 09:49 AM
 
Originally posted by christ:
I have a 533DP, with an airport card, and a 667TiPB, with an airport card. (none of this extreme nonsense).

1) When I connect via airport in my 1930s brick built house (in the UK), the range is around 10 feet. Fine in the same room, fine through a stud (wood) wall or through the window, but zero through a brick wall (actually zero is not quite correct - I appear to have from half to full signal, but very limited data exchange - pings are possible but take forever to return, with 50%+ packet loss). Is this
(a) normal for all airport connections
(b) a function of the TiPB's crap range, and therfore
(c) if I were to get a base station would this 'fix' the problem, so I can get a range of 20-30 feet (so that I can connect the base station to a cable modem in a different room from the 533DP).

2) When the two machines are in the same room, and the airport network is fair whizzing along, How do I 'Internet share'?
(a) I have a 56k modem on the 533DP, is it possible to share this internet connection over airport? If so then
(b) how do I connect to the internet from the TiPB - what settings do I have to set? Do I have to give the IP address of the 533DP as a proxy, or what?

All help appreciated, as (as you may guess from the desperate tone of the stupid questions above) I have not got _clue one_ about this wireless magick.
Chris,

Nice place, Gosport - I believe that so many people like it they are converting HMS Daedalus into a dorm!

Now - to business. I bought an airport yesterday. I have an 800 G4 Powerbook. I ran the setup assistant and the ISP settings were sent from the Powerbook to the ABS. The only problem I had was that it was already passworded and I had to reset it. It now works a dream. You press dial on the airport icon and it dials the internet - cool!

As regards the reception, I cannot comment, its too early. Hope this helps.

Paul
     
Jordan
Dedicated MacNNer
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: Paris, France
Status: Offline
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Feb 13, 2003, 07:27 PM
 
Chris,

Having just moved to the UK am suffering the same fate with brick walls.

I saw that there is some sort of booster for the Airport Extreme available that will extend the range.

Not sure if there is something available in the UK for plain old Airport.

Anyone know of any booster devices???

(I have a Cube and a PB Ti)
iPod Photo 60GB + 1Gb iPod Shuffle + iPod/3G/15GB + iPod Mini (Silver)
24" iMac 2.8Ghz/2GB/SuperDrive
Mac mini 1.66Ghz Intel Core Duo/1GB/SuperDrive + iPod Nano (Black)
     
ghporter
Administrator
Join Date: Apr 2001
Location: San Antonio TX USA
Status: Offline
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Feb 14, 2003, 08:33 PM
 
The quantity of metal in the wall, to include electrical wires, reinforcing rods or mesh, stucco lath, etc. can really degrade the signal quality of an AirPort connection. So can the density of the bricks and mortar used in the walls. In the 1930s they didn't use a lot of metal in brick walls, but they did use a lot of wood to ensure stability during construction in double layer brick walls. Good, solid mortar is a very good moisture barrier, too. Unfortunately, the frequency used by AirPort devices is very near the resonant frequency of water. This causes signal disruptions when a person walks directly between the two ends of a wireless connection. It could also mean that there's a nice, humid layer of air inside your dense brick wall. Sorry.

Glenn -----OTR/L, MOT, Tx
     
   
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