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Simply put wireless is typically slower. The theoretical maximums are 1000/100/10 for wired (with 100 still being commonplace) and 270-300/56/11 for wireless (with 56/11 still being commonplace) but yeah if you have b router it slows things tremendously.

You can buy cheaper than Airport but in my opinion, it's not worth it. When you add features like gigabit ethernet, N wireless, USB support, dual ban the router start approaching the same price range. However Mac support is often, at best, an afterthought and the overall reviews, like at Amazon and NewEgg, suck for a majority of routers like that.

Anecdotally speaking, my brother in law has had a lot of bad experiences with D-Link (half the time they just wouldn't work with his Macs and the other time they'd work poorly). My Belkin & Netgear were total bastard to update the firmware, especially if you have a Mac. The Belkin ignored Firewall Port Forwarding settings and died about 1 year after I bought it. My Netgear didn't allow for in network file transfer and needed to be reset fairly regularly. Every router I've used besides the AP had very limited Firewall Port Forwarding setup options (usually 10-20 ranges).

Yeah I heared wonderful things about Linksys G routers. Less so about the N routers however. Still they seem leader of the Airport alternative pack from what I hear.

Here is one thing Airport has over other routers (even Linksys):



That one entry would use up 3-4 of the available port forward ranges on almost any other router.

The main reason I want a new router is that my cable connection is now 13-15 Mbps, at least with a wired connection to my old router.  (Officially, I'm paying for 12 Mbps).  So I want a wireless connection that can keep up.  A review by InformationWeek leads me to wonder whether the Airport is up to this task.  They say: "Unfortunately, its numbers on a mixed network failed to impress. At a distance of 10 feet on a mixed network, the router scored just 14Mbps -- a very low showing for such a high-priced router."  The story is better for N-only mode, but I couldn't use that because one of my computers is a G4 iMac with an 802.11g wireless card (from 2003).  The same InformationWeek review put the Buffalo Technology Wireless-N Nfiniti (WZR2-G300N) router at the top of the heap.  Unfortunately, I can't seem to find it for sale. (Neither Amazon nor B&H seem to have it, for example).

So. . . I'm hearing strong praise for the Apple router here, but the reviews seem to indicate that could be the limiting factor in my network.  The D-Link looks interesting, although another review (Ars Technica) found that it had poor performance through walls and doors in their testing.  I had a Linksys 5 years ago, fought with it for a night, and exchanged it for a D-Link after finding out about the company's refusal to support Macs.

Maybe I should just give up and string some cable?

Indeed, many of the Airport articles were no doubt more than a couple months old (which is before they introduced the new Base Stations) I an older Gigabit N Airport have get really good speeds wirelessly but then again it's typically not a mixed network.

Here the most recent Ars article.

Try this:

Got it working now. Just needed to reboot the cable modem! For some reason there is no longer any authentication on a mac address change from my isp which usually need a webpage signup! This has vanished, but I'm not complaining!

To reboot I've been told to unplug everything for at least 30 seconds to a minute (longer does not hurt).

Worst case scenario I found this tip:

Call tech support. Tell them you changed computers (or tell them the truth-that you want to use your AirPort so you can surf from the sofa) and give them the MAC address of the AirPort unit. You should know that the MAC addresses for AirPort equipment are from a separate sequence from those for Apple's ethernet network cards, so if there's anyone on the ball at your cable provider, they'll know that the new address is from an AirPort device-if your customer agreement doesn't allow you to use wireless network equipment on your cable modem, you'll be out of luck.

Firewall is a decent excuse too.

Thanks guys!  I just ordered the Airport.  I was tempted by the speed of the D-Link, and there's a new Linksys WRT400N that SmallNetBuilder claims is "the one to beat."  Even though the Apple didn't always win the speed competitions, it usually was the most reliable.  I think it will be a good choice for my apartment, where I can sometimes see half a dozen networks from my neighbors.  The dual-radio, dual-band feature should help with my mixed network.  And the interface and setup will probably be top-of-class.  And it has gigabit ethernet.

--Dave

dv wrote:

ScifiterX wrote:

Most ISPs pull that computer's MAC Address scam so you will buy or rent networking equipment from them.

Clone the MAC.

That seems to be the best bet, but the old reviews said that the Apple Airport lacks that feature -- unless it's been added to the new version?

Or he could simply call Comcast and give them the MAC of his router and thereby fix the problem.

Mega-thanks for all your help, folks!  I just fired up my new Simultaneous Dual-Band Airport.  I unplugged the cable modem for about half an hour, then connected the cables, then powered the cable modem and let it sync, and then powered up the Airport.  I had to remember to turn Airport on (the icon in the menu bar).  And then I just went through a few short steps in the Airport Utility.  I selected the option to copy my old network.  And. . . this is almost too easy!  This was soooo much easier than the two long nights I spent in 2003 setting up my old D-Link DI-614+.

Now I should probably go back in the manual config and do things like set passwords and MAC addresses.

The other thing: going back in, AirPort Utility says "This AirPort Extreme should be updated to a newer firmware version" -- from 7.4 to 7.4.1.  Was that the version that a bunch of people had problems with?

Thanks,

Dave

It should happen automagically.