Airport is pricey, but as with all Apple things bound to be easiest. It throws in a modem, which is relatively useless for you, and a printer port, which is pretty sexy. The new airport extreme is based on a draft of the specification and there's [in my assessment] a 50/50 chance that you'll bleed on the bleeding edge. However, it's the nicest thing out there are twice the price.
Then you have netgear, d-link and linksys as the major companies you'll be looking at for normal routers. Other's like MS and Belkin are trying to edge in, but these are the three major companies. I normally recommend netgear because they feel more SOHO than consumer and therefore you are buying the lower range of their brand and not the upper range of the consumer brand. However, I have one of the new netgears and it has one irritational problem: Idle connections die over it in very short time. A couple of minutes. This is a big problem for me, as I ssh [secure telnet] a lot, but probably less for a normal consumer. Still, it could cause problems on some things like internet games that require a constant, quiet connection. Netgear are also known for dire customer service. I'd suggest trying Linksys, their simplicity has always impressed me. Getting an old 802.11b system will not save you much, will be slower, but could be simpler to deal with. If I wasn't already committed to a house full of netgear components [and once you choose a brand, life is easier to stay with that brand in wireless I believe] I would probably go for the new airport extreme with the print server. Hen On Thu, 8 May 2003, Diane Stinnett wrote: > I am considering getting a wireless set up, such as Airport, and > wondered if anyone wanted to put in their 2? about what's good. We have > 3 computers that we would want on the network. The main computer is a > G4 that is about 2 years old. We also have an ibook and a beige G3. All > are running variations of Jaguar. The main purpose of the network would > be to share a cable modem that is currently hooked up the the G4 tower, > but we also may want to transfer a file now and then. I read the write > up on the new Airport Extreme in MacWorld this month, and I think that > may be more bandwidth than I need. Is Airport the way to go, or is > there another product out there that will give me more bang for my > buck? I also want something that is fairly easy to set up and > troubleshoot, because my knowledge of the inner workings of computers > is average at best. > > This is your chance to rant about your wireless network (or complain > about it, whichever the case may be)! > > Thanks for helping. > > Diane Stinnett > > > | The next meeting of the Louisville Computer Society will > | be May 27. The LCS Web page is <http://www.kymac.org>. > | The next meeting of the Louisville Computer Society will | be May 27. The LCS Web page is <http://www.kymac.org>. | This list's page is <http://erdos.math.louisville.edu/macgroup>.
