On Thu, Jun 18, 2009 at 4:15 PM, Kris Tilford<[email protected]> wrote: > You're saying I can have 802.11n clients using only the 5GHz band, and > simultaneously use 802.11b/g clients on the 2.4GHz band?
That's my understanding of what it means when the specs for the AirPort Extreme (Early 2009) say it supports "2.4GHz and 5GHz simultaneously". You should be able to set it up to use different protocols on the different bands. (That *is* the version of the AirPort Extreme you have, correct?) > How do I set this up with Apple Airport 802.11n router? Wouldn't this require > the > router to appears as two separate networks on different channels? Unfortunately, since I don't own one of the new dual band AirPort Extremes, I haven't a clue. I tried going to the Apple support section to see what I could find there, but I came up empty. (Perhaps I just don't know where to look?) What I kept running into were instructions in the manuals along the lines of "Open AirPort Utility, select your base station, and follow the onscreen instructions to create your new network". I know almost everyone else apparently *loves* it when Apple shields its customers from details. But for me I often find them a bit *too* much like an appliance for my tastes. Sometimes I *want* to work with the details. Oh, well. I expect you would set this up it by specifying a different SSID and protocol for each band. The SSID is often referred to as the wireless "network name" but in this context that's misleading. You'd only have one wireless (and wired) local network that all the connected devices would be part of. The SSID in this case is more of a name for the method used to connect to that network. Since I could not find anything on the Apple site, the best I could do was a link to a screen shot from a review of a LinkSys WRT600N dual band router over at smallnetbuilder.com. All the screen shot shows you is that you can configure both the 2.4 and the 5GHz band separately. I expect the AirPort Extreme also provides this capability ... somehow. http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/myincludes/image_page.php?/images/stories/wireless/linksys_wrt600n/linksys_wrt600n_wireless_basic.png Of course, all the above assumes that your wireless (client) PCI adapter also supports using the 5GHz band. Not all of them do. Adding support for the extra band adds to the cost of the adapter so it's often left out to reduce the manufacturing cost of an adapter. If the 802.11n adapter you're thinking of getting says it supports 802.11b, 802.11g, and 802.11n but leaves out 802.11a then it would not be able to talk to your airport on the 5GHz band. It would only support 802.11n in the 2.4GHz band. -irrational john --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
