Linksys PC Card Works with AirPort Extreme
Poster Nick Sayer fiddled with a WPC54G card from Linksys and was able to get it to act like an AirPort Extreme card by a little file editing. Thanks, Nick!
Poster Nick Sayer fiddled with a WPC54G card from Linksys and was able to get it to act like an AirPort Extreme card by a little file editing. Thanks, Nick!
Reports are coming in that some people have AirPort Extreme Base Stations in hand and others have been notified they're coming in the next day or so. Reports welcome on actual performance. Screen captures of the latest AirPort Admin Utility very welcome.
Apple really flummoxes me: I expected 3 to 6 months before the PowerMac line would be renovated to include AirPort Extreme. Color me pleased and surprised. Apple announced that the new single 1 GHz, dual 1.25 GHZ, and dual 1.42 GHz PowerMacs will include support for (but not built-in) AirPort Extreme and Bluetooth.
You'd think that with a new, fully featured base station on the way for $199 in the next few days to weeks that eBay would have already reflected this price drop in reselling new and used graphite and snow units? Yes and know (as in "in the know"). The average price for a graphite seems way down to about $100 or so. But people are still paying $175 to $200 or more for new and used snow base stations.
Advise your friends! Fool your enemies. The eBay price for a snow should be less than $150 within the next two weeks as reality finally sets in once the Extreme units ship.
Although AirPort Extreme units were supposed to ship this next week, according to original estimates, it seems more likely now that they are 1 to 3 weeks away. The 12-inch PowerBook was delayed, too, reports indicate. It's possible that a new release of Mac OS X 10.2 is being finalized to push through a dot update that will handle the requirement of the new hardware and software, and that until that's ready Apple may be reticent to put equipment or products in people's hands. It should become clear soon enough. I hope to have my hands on some Extreme equipment as soon as the week following this one.
In just reviewing the Apple Store's pricing and availability for AirPort equipment, I noticed that the AirPort Card for the original slot is now $79, down from its $99 price since introduction. The new Extreme products are still listed as 2-4 weeks out.
Some folks at AppleXNews.com spread the rumor from itsthebomb.com that existing AirPort Cards could be flashed with a firmware upgrade to support AirPort Extreme (802.11g).
Unfortunately, the folks spreading this rumor don't understand how the AirPort Card works. It's not a software-define radio (SDR) which can magically reconfigure itself, but rather a piece of burned silicon containing a radio baseband and physical layer (PHY) that can't be changed just through a firmware upgrade.
The 802.11g draft calls for OFDM encoding (orthogonal frequency division multiplexing) instead of 802.11b's CCK (I've forgotten the acronym). With OFDM, instead of treating the whole swath of spectrum in a channel as a single unit and encoding symbols across the width, the channel is divided into a number of subchannels. Symbols are sent over longer periods of time simultaneously which dramatically improves the ability of a transceiver to deal with signal reflection which delays receiving symbols all at the same time.
This results in better throughput overall, and better indoor performance. Even if you could only get the same speed at 802.11b with 802.11g, you'd have more and faster coverage areas with 802.11g.
So what does this have to do with the original AirPort Card? The OFDM encoding hardware -- the radio and its components -- isn't in the original card. It can't be updated through firmware to reconfigure its hard-burned silicon radio components. The silicon necessary to handle OFDM at 2.4 GHz just started shipping in December in quantities that Linksys and Buffalo were able to take advantage of.
Further, the AirPort Card bus runs at the slower, original PC Card (PCMCIA) speed, which is far below 54 Mbps. So even if you could flash the silicon, you wouldn't really be able to use the card correctly.
Only newer machines or machines that can take PC and PCI cards will be able to handle 802.11g. USB is too slow for adapters: 12 Mbps!
I'd love to be wrong about this, but it's physically impossible without a time machine that would have made the appropriate radio silicon available in 1999.
Remember that although you can post comments on this Weblog, we have a fully threaded discussion forum meant for longer, threaded back and forth right here.
Henry Norr, a long-time Mac veteran and now a regular SF newspaper columnist, shreds the draft 802.11g equipment he tested in a column today. A cautionary tale about interim standards.
Over at MacSlash, they've been discussing AirPort Extreme and related issues prompted by my submitting our article on 802.11g. A recent post asked why the article avoided discussing Cisco's LEAP (Lightweight Encapsulated Authentication Protocol), and equating LEAP with a solution to Wi-Fi's security woes.
Unfortunately, LEAP isn't a security solution at the encryption level. Rather, LEAP is a corporate/institutional method of ensuring that you can restrict access to a network via a wireless gateway only to users with passwords, while also ensuring that the username and password are encrypted. It's a tricky problem: how do you set up a secure channel to exchange information when you have parties that don't know each other? Smart folks are working on it, but Microsoft and Cisco are backing one standard--PEAP or Protected EAP which Cisco is using to replace LEAP--and other folks are backing a very similar incompatible protocol called EAP-TTLS (EAP-Tunneled Transport Layer Security).
For a primer on these issues, check out the article I wrote on this topic for InfoWorld which ran last week.
The basics are this: encryption in Wi-Fi (and AirPort plain and Extreme) is severely broken. It's easy to crack a WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy) key that's used to scramble data in transit. Also, WEP is a shared secret, so all devices with a WEP key can see all the data in the clear passing over a network.
A new security standard called WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) fixes the cryptographic flaws while including the framework for handling logging users into a network. However, it doesn't cope with encrypting the login part of the transaction! That's were the various secured EAP flavors come in.
Until the secured EAP (PEAP and EAP-TTLS) protocols are finalized and start appearing in operating systems -- Microsoft is offering limited PEAP support in XP and 2000 with 98/Me/NT to come and free EAP-TTLS clients are available for Linux, Mac OS, and Windows -- it's hard to deploy systems that use them to secure these kinds of wireless sessions.
It gets very complicated very fast especially when one can't point to concrete examples. We'll be writing much more about this when it all becomes a reality instead of a set of fighting standards.
WPA, in contrast to all the compexity of EAP-based authentication, is straightforward: firmware upgrade and then a simple password which hides robust cryptographic improvements.
In all the buzz about AirPort Extreme, it's important to also note that Apple included Bluetooth as a built-in part of its new 12- and 17-inch PowerBooks G4s (that's cafeteria tray and lunchbox, for short).
By including Bluetooth, Apple is certainly signaling its intentions to make it a continued core part of future product communications. It's too low of a speed to use as a networking method -- raw 1 Mbps -- but it's plenty fast for synchronization tasks and peripheral control.
We'll start seeing practically every kind of input and output controller (keyboards, mice, trackballs, joysticks, game controllers) sport Bluetooth either in a special model or as an either/or option (USB + Bluetooth). Every cell phone will have Bluetooth built in soon. (I have a T68i and I can't tell you how Bluetooth transforms my interaction with the cell phone, from syncing names and numbers to using it as a modem. Watch this space for more on that front.)
Apple couldn't just plug Bluetooth in as an option to existing systems, though, for the same reason they couldn't just add AirPort Extreme. Because Bluetooth and Wi-Fi/AirPort share the 2.4 GHz spectrum, Apple had to coordinate the two wireless systems. Their two-antenna design in the big and little aluminum PowerBook G4s uses diversity in two ways: one antenna can be dedicated to Bluetooth and the other to AirPort, or both can be used by either system depending on need. The antenna selection is automatic.
Antenna diversity, or using multiple antennas to send and receive signals, can help sort out signal reflection because two antennas will receive signals at slightly different intervals, allowing better cancellation.
A reader asked whether Apple will be supporting WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access), which is the Wi-Fi Alliance's interim security update that fixes the broken model found in the current Wi-Fi/802.11a/b equipment. The answer is in the article (see below) about 802.11g, but I can expand a little here.
In brief, WPA is a way to plug the encryption and integrity flaws used in the current generation security system while vastly increasing both complexity and simplicity. Complexity in that more different keys are generated making millions of times more difficult to break the system, if that easy; simplicity in adopting an Apple AirPort-like interface for setting passwords. (If you want to read more about WPA and wireless weaknesses, read this article on my Wi-Fi Weblog.)
Apple's VP of hardware, Greg Joswiak, was very frank to Adam and I about WPA. Apple is well aware of it and is monitoring its support in the industry. They don't want to be a trendsetter on this front, as they don't want to pour time and money into something that isn't going to be widely adopted. But their chipmaking partner -- who they won't confirm is Broadcom -- has already committed to WPA support.
What this means is that it would take relatively little effort for Apple to add WPA support once Broadcom provides the upgrades necessary. Apple would have to push out a firmware change and some minor software changes to use WPA. If WPA gets momentum, Apple will be behind it.
A commenter asked why we didn't provide first-hand reaction to the AirPort Extreme units in the article (see below) that covers 802.11g and Extreme. We should have pointed out: we haven't touched the things beyond looking at them and talking with Apple about them. Apple expects to be shipping Extreme units by the end of the month, and we hope to have review units in hand to write about before they ship.
A friend wrote in to ask whether the bridging feature in the new AirPort Extreme Base Stations -- which allows two to four of them to connect wireless and form a larger network -- works with the older graphite or snow Base Stations. Unfortunately, no. You must have Extreme units to get the bridging function at all.
There are options for adding bridging to existing networks or extending them, notably the Linksys WET11, which is a $100-odd device that looks like a client adapter to an access point, but it can stream all the traffic behind. We write about this in The Wireless Networking Starter Kit or you can read an article I wrote about it for O'Reilly Networks.
Adam and I have written a 3,000-word article on the state of 802.11g equipment including an enormous amount of detail about AirPort Extreme: both the Base Station and the AirPort Extreme Card. This article will be available next week as a downloadable PDF with illustrations and photos, too.
Your feedback is highly welcome! You're seeing an early draft of what will be incorporated into a mythical next edition of The Wireless Networking Starter Kit, and we're always eager to hear more detail or get direction from people using the technology.
In a few days, we'll post a long addendum to The Wireless Networking Starter Kit focusing on the AirPort Extreme Base Station and Card, as well as other aspects of 802.11g.
Here's a brief preview of the shipping and soon to ship 802.11g equipment. (Prices are all the lowest price at Amazon.com or via the companies' online stores.)
Apple: The AirPort Extreme Base Station comes in two models, priced at $199 and $249. The units can bridge to each other while acting as access points for wireless clients. The new AirPort Extreme Card ($99) is built into the new 17-inch PowerBook G4 and an option for the 12-inch PowerBook G4. Older machines won't be upgradable because the original AirPort Card bus is too slow. USB adapters aren't an option because USB runs at just 12 Mbps.
Belkin: Many Mac users know Belkin as a cable and cord company, but the firm has been shipping a variety of networking products, including inexpensive Bluetooth adapters, for some time. Belkin has promised Mac drivers by February for Mac OS 8.6 and later. The company planned to ship by Jan. 15 four devices: a wired/wireless gateway (F5D7230-4, retail price $150), a plain access point (F5D7130, $140), a PC Card (F5D7010, $80), and a PCI Card (F5D7000, $80).
Linksys: Linksys has two gateways and two cards. The WRT54G is a combination wired switch and wireless gateway which updates their BEFW11S4 model ($130). The WAP54G is a simple access point that updates their WAP11 model ($130). The WPC54G PC Card ($70) is available now, and the WMP54G PCI adapter ($70) is coming soon. Linksys has little to no Macintosh support for any of its existing products.
D-Link: D-Link is offering products under its complicated brand name of AirPlus Xtreme G. They also have a wired/wireless gateway (DI-624, $149), plain access point (DWL-2000AP, $140), PC Card (DWL-G650, $80), and PCI Card (DWL-G520, $90). D-Link has offered limited AppleTalk support in its previous offerings, and Mac drivers are unlikely.
Buffalo: Buffalo has its AirStation G54 Broadband Router Access Point (WBR-G54) for a retail price of $200 and a PC Card (WLI-CB-G54) for $100. Streets prices should be less. The company has offered limited Mac support in the past.
As Apple introduces its AirPort Extreme update to its wireless networking system, we thought it was time to launch an Apple AirPort-specific Weblog that would cover news related to using Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and other wireless devices under the Mac OS operating system. AirPort is the center of the universe, but other wireless technologies spin around it.
Who are we? I'm Glenn Fleishman, a freelance journalist who writes about technology for several newspapers and magazines (see http://glennf.com/writing for past articles). Adam Engst is a long-time Macintosh journalist and one of the most well-known writers in the field; he publishes TidBITS, the longest-running personal technology newsletter on the Internet.
We just wrote The Wireless Networking Starter Kit which covers both Windows and Macintosh, and we wanted to focus more here on just the Mac facts.