Wireless with Bell South? Or in WNC?

[Bedawyn]

Is anyone here in the Western North Carolina area? I just moved to Asheville, and -- thanks to the modemless downgrade on the new Mac Minis *boggled* -- am limited to an-hour-a-day library Internet use until I can get a lease signed and wireless set up. There seems to be a confusing number of wireless providers here, but since I'll need a BellSouth phone anyway, their wireless plan seems the simplest to go with. Are there Mac incompatibility problems I should be aware of? Do I need to buy an Airport base station or will the gateway BellSouth wants to sell me do the job with my Mac Mini? It would be easier to afford right now -- I don't use credit cards, so might not be able to get a base station right away if I can't do it through BellSouth, which at least will just add it to the phone bill in installments. And I _need_ some sort of wireless set up, soon. I am slowly withering away for lack of proper Internet access. I shall be a dried-up husk of myself if I don't get a new ISP soon. We're going on three weeks without now.

 

[wordmunger]

I have Bellsouth DSL. I got it ages ago, so things could be different now -- I have a DSL modem they provided that then hooks into an Airport Extreme Base Station -- they don't provide a wireless router. When I signed up, I pretty much had to pretend like I was using a PC, then I configured the Airport myself. It's not hard, though.

I imagine things are better now, now that wireless has gotten a lot more standardized, but it's definitely doable. You don't have to buy an Airport -- Linksys or other generic routers work fine as well. Who knows, maybe they give you the wireless router when you sign up now.

OTOH, Airport Express is the only way to stream music from your computer to your stereo, so that might be the best way for you to go anyway.

EDIT: If you have a Mini, then I think their DSL modem should work fine just running directly to your ethernet port. Do you have a separate PC laptop that you want to use? I think you can then use the Mini as your wireless hub for that.

 

[leishan]

I've been using Bellsouth DSL for almost 6 months now with no issues. I'm using a Linksys wireless router (WRT54G), though. I think they charge you more if you use their home networking "solution", so I would just use the modem they provide and set your own network up.

Hope this helps...

 

[Bedawyn]

Do you have a separate PC laptop that you want to use?

Whatever would I want one of those for?

I'm leaning toward using whatever BellSouth provides, just because I'm on a tight budget right now with moving and looking for a new job and all. BellSouth charges you for it, but they charge it in installments over a few months (and claim they're rebate it a year later), so I won't mind paying a little more for it overall that way, if it's less right away, as long as I know it will work.

I'm afraid I'm still confused about the hardware, though -- and unfortunately, from the library computer I can't find the same BellSouth explanation pages I have bookmarked on my own computer. (And -- evil! Internet Explorer! I'd forgotten how nasty it is -- haven't used anything but Safari and Firefox for a couple of years now. No. Tabs. Must. Have. Tabs.) The one BellSouth FAQ page says you need an Ethernet or USB port, but that kinds of contradicts the idea of "wireless". BellSouth wants to sell/give you EITHER a DSL modem or something they call a "home networking gateway", which looked on the better pages I can't currently find like what I want. All I need right away is the Mac Mini connected to the Internet, although I also have an older iMac, with a dialup modem but not Airport, that I'd eventually like to have on DSL as well. "Eventually" isn't really in the budget right now, but I'd also prefer not to have to completely redo things once it is in the budget.

Thanks for your advice.