Cube + Airport Extreme Base Station = ?

[cosmichobo]

G'day,

I recently picked up a G4 Cube (originally 450MHz, but now using a 1.5Ghz upgrade card), which has an original Airport card installed. The Cube is running OS 10.5.8, has 1.5GB RAM.

Initially, the system did not see any wifi network, despite 2 originating from just a few metres away - from my 2011 Airport Extreme Base Station (which I use for all my devices), and Netcomm Wireless modem (which I currently use solely to say "you killed my dog" to our neighbors).

After a few days, suddenly the card sees them both, but wont connect to either.

Aha - the original card only handles WEP or WPA... and the AEBS was set to WPA2... So, I changed the setting to WPA/WPA2. Nope - still just "times out" when I try to connect...

I then tried all 3 of the a/n b/g/n settings, but again, nothing...

Can someone point me in the right direction here, as I have read plenty of people saying that the original card can connect to a AEBS...???

Thanks

cosmic

 

[redheeler]

WiFi reception has always been terrible on my Cube. I've checked the antenna internally, seems to be connected properly. Right now no networks appear in the list at all.

I recommend using a wired/Ethernet connection if you can. Even when it works, the original AirPort 802.11b is slow.

 

[cosmichobo]

Thanks for the reply, redheeler.

My plan is to use the Cube as a HTPC, and whilst I wont try to stream media to it (I've got a 4TB cloud drive that I'll connect to it directly), I'm hoping to use WiFi for screen sharing/Rowmote, and for copying over files to the cloud.

In terms of reception, the Cube and Airport Ethernet Base Station are in directly line of sight, maybe 3-4m apart... so I hoped it would at least establish a connection...

Think I'll pull the card out then re-seat it... see if that does anything...

Cheers

cosmic

 

[MacCubed]

Thanks for the reply, redheeler.

My plan is to use the Cube as a HTPC, and whilst I wont try to stream media to it (I've got a 4TB cloud drive that I'll connect to it directly), I'm hoping to use WiFi for screen sharing/Rowmote, and for copying over files to the cloud.

In terms of reception, the Cube and Airport Ethernet Base Station are in directly line of sight, maybe 3-4m apart... so I hoped it would at least establish a connection...

Think I'll pull the card out then re-seat it... see if that does anything...

Cheers

cosmic

If you plan on copying files, use Ethernet! The original AP cards are extremely slow compared to Ethernet

 

[cosmichobo]

Thanks for the heads up, MacCubed, but if it's just a few 300MB files now and then, I'll just set them up to copy over at night or something. Ethernet is really not an option as a permanent setup.

 

[redheeler]

I'm hoping to use WiFi for screen sharing/Rowmote, and for copying over files to the cloud.

Screen Sharing is barely usable over the original AirPort. I have tried it with my Cube and dual-processor G4 MDD, both lagged heavily.

Edit: I do have it set to uncompressed though. Using a compressed mode it'd probably work a little better, but still not as well as over a wired connection.

 

[cosmichobo]

Screen Sharing is barely usable over the original AirPort. I have tried it with my Cube and dual-processor G4 MDD, both lagged heavily.

Edit: I do have it set to uncompressed though. Using a compressed mode it'd probably work a little better, but still not as well as over a wired connection.

The screen sharing is purely for control of the machine - ie navigating to the next movie in Frontrow... not actually displaying the screen content, because we will be sitting in front of the tv that the Cube is displaying on.

I just need to know how to get them to talk at all.....

 

[Altemose]

I just need to know how to get them to talk at all.....

The original AirPort card will not work when the router is in WPA/WPA2 mode. It must either be in WEP or WPA - TKIP mode.