Brian's Brain

As I forecasted a week and a half ago, I've retired (at least for the moment) my Linksys WRT54GC IEEE 802.11g Wi-Fi-supportive router. Its successor (again, at least for the moment) is a second-generation Apple Airport Extreme 'N' model; I'd tested the first iteration of this particular design (model #MA073LL/A) more than a year ago, and the particular variant I'm now using (model #MB053LL/A) incorporates GbE-capable LAN and WAN ports.

The migration process was (echoing past history) easier than I feared it'd be. I tethered the new router to my MacBook via CAT5 cable; next to them was my Dell laptop wirelessly connected to the old router. As such, I was able to manually re-enter various existing LAN settings into the Airport Extreme 'N':

• SSID name and no-broadcast status, and wireless encryption key
• DHCP starting address and range
• Static DHCP assignments
• Firewall open port definitions

Then I simply powered down and disconnected the WRT54GC, put the Airport Express 'N' in its place, fired it up...and everything just worked. Since I'm not aware that the Airport Extreme 'N' does any QoS processing of its own, I kept the Linksys OGV200 Network Optimizer in-between the router and DSL modem.

Granted, the Airport Express 'N' isn't perfect...but then, what is? Several of my minor grumbles are repeats of what I said in my August 2, 2007 hands-on project writeup. The Airport Extreme 'N' only offers three LAN ports, versus four in the WRT54GC, which necessitated a bit of CAT5 re-plumbing. And as with other Apple products, its configuration requires the use of a dedicated application (Airport Utility, available for both OS X and Windows...sorry, Linux users) versus harnessing the traditional web server-based browser screen scheme employed by the vast majority of networking gear I've tested over the years. With that latter point said, I was glad to find out while at Reno Airport two days ago waiting for my flight to Los Angeles that the Airport Express 'N' is also accessible via Airport Utility over the Internet as long as you've enabled the router setting which enables configuration through the WAN port.

Other so-far criticisms of the Airport Extreme are more troubling. The evening I set up the router, I went into the kitchen to make dinner with both my Apple MacBook and Dell XPS M1330 LAN-connected over Wi-Fi. As part of my meal preparation process, I fired up the microwave oven. When I returned to the living room (after the microwave oven was again off), both laptops' wireless network connections were severed. Toggling AirPort off then back on in the MacBook settings restored connectivity, but with the XPS M1330 I had no such luck; rebooting the system didn't even work. As it turned out, I had to enable SSID broadcast in the router before the Dell laptop would again connect.

Granted, I haven't yet messed around with the broadcast channel settings to see if I can explicitly find a sub-frequency that isn't plagued with destructive interference. But the WRT54GC didn't seem to have any problems coexisting with the microwave oven. 2.4 GHz ISM band spectrum corruption is an issue I've covered on an ongoing basis for years, and it's disappointing to find the problem still regularly rearing its ugly head. At least with alternative 802.11n routers such as Linksys' WRT610N, you're able to simultaneously broadcast on the 2.4 GHz and 5.8 GHz ISM bands, so 5.8 GHz-capable 802.11a and 802.11n LAN clients can employ this less cluttered (albeit shorter-range) frequency option. No such luck with Airport Express 'N'; it's 2.4 GHz or 5.8 GHz, and the preponderance of legacy 802.11b/g gear I still own necessitates the microwave oven-inhabiting spectrum option.

Speaking of legacy gear, I also had problems with the Airport Express 'N' wireless encryption settings. The unit optionally supports a WEP mode labeled 'Transitional Security Network', which I chose at first since I already had a lot of WEP-configured gear. The first stumble I encountered was that Airport Express 'N' doesn't support 64-bit (i.e. 5 ASCII character) WEP keys, only (for valid robustness reasons) the higher-grade 128-bit (i.e. 13 ASCII character) WEP option. So I went off and reconfigured my wireless LAN gear with a new key.

Even then, as I realize in retrospect via my research that others have already discovered, Apple's WEP 'transitional mode' doesn't fully work as advertised. My Nokia N800 Internet Tablet, for example, still saw the Airport Express 'N' as a WPA2-broadcasting piece of gear and refused to connect with the WEP key. The same thing initially happened with my Windows XP-based netbook when it saw the SSID broadcast and offered to connect me to the router; I worked around that issue by manually entering the router's SSID and WEP key details, upon which I was able to successfully mate the MSI Wind with the Airport Express 'N'.

My D-Link DCS-5300W 802.11b-based webcam made a connection but was unable to sustain it, while its DCS-5300G 802.11g-based peer outright refused to pair up with the router over Wi-Fi. So I bit the bullet and again encryption-migrated the Airport Express 'N' and LAN clients, this time to the router's 'WPA/WPA2 Personal' mode. The only two pieces of gear that didn't wirelessly survive the transition were the DCS-5300W and my first-generation Roku SoundBridge M500 networked music player. Both devices support only 802.11b (the SoundBridge via a CompactFlash add-in adapter), and neither is WPA-capable (a function of their advanced ages and their vendors' apparently unwillingness to upgrade their feature sets via firmware, not a reflection of their B-only wireless capabilities), so I've instead tethered them to the router via HomePlug AV powerline spurs.

Broadcast range between the Airport Extreme 'N' and its WRT54GC predecessor seems to be a 'wash' and wasn't a big deal anyway, considering the diminutive size of my residence. Keep in mind, though that I'm comparing the Apple hardware to a Linksys unit paired with an external antenna. On the one hand, this results variance says encouraging things about the innate signal strength of the Apple router. On the other hand, I wish the Airport Extreme 'N' also supported an optional external antenna connection so that, if necessary, I could further amplify its capabilities.

My final Airport Extreme 'N' grumble concerns performance. I'd hoped that by migrating from 802.11g to higher (claimed) bandwidth 802.11n, I might for example no longer need to tether the Dell laptop (acting as a Windows Vista Media Center server) to my Xbox 360s (acting as Media Center Extenders) over powerline adapters in order to ensure sufficient bandwidth for high-def video streaming. Alas, this dream has so far gone unrealized. Network performance monitoring initiated both at the laptop and game console consistently reports insufficient sustained bandwidth for high-def content, with the laptop wirelessly connected to the router. Granted, IEEE 802.11n is still at least theoretically a draft specification, so continued improvement is at least theoretically possible. But practically speaking, the plethora of gear already in the market has created a de facto standard, so I don't expect that my situation's going to improve in the future.

Once again, I can't help but wonder what could have been...

Followup: I migrate from WEP to WPA just in time for WPA to also get cracked (in one data flow direction, at least). Isn't that special...fortunately, a workaround exists.