Airport Extreme for Internet Sharing
 

Trying to install an Airport Extreme to my G4 so my wife can surf the Internet from her Sony PC.
My ISP is BellSouth Fast Access but I cannot log into my ISP if the Airport Extreme is install, I tried all I know and cannot connect to the Internet in my G4 if the Airport Extreme is "install".
Doing something wrong but no idea what it is. Anyone using BellSouth Fast Access can help me in how to install Airport Extreme.
I have an Alcatel Speed Touch Home from BellSouth.
Thanks

Are you using the Alcatel with USb or Ethernet ? And also could you state which version of Mac OS X and G4 model you use ?

Ethernet and my Mac OS X is 10.4.3
Machine Name: Power Mac G4 (AGP graphics)
Machine Model: PowerMac3,1
CPU Type: PowerPC G4 (2.8)
Number Of CPUs: 1
CPU Speed: 500 MHz
L2 Cache (per CPU): 1 MB
Memory: 512 MB
Bus Speed: 100 MHz
Boot ROM Version: 4.2.8f1

Since the Airport Extreme has only a single Ethernet port and I think it can only be used as a WAN port (i.e. usually used for connection to the Internet side of things - i.e. the connection to your Alcatel modem), I'm not how you intended this all to be connected. Maybe I'm not understanding something.

Usually people with more than one computer get a router/switch box that several computers can be plugged into (with Ethernet). If you had a box like that you could plug the Airport Extreme into one of the ports. Your G4 would get plugged into another of the ports on that box. The box would plug into your Alcatel modem. Then your G4 wouldn't be involved at all in the connection between your wife's PC and the Internet.

I don't know either, no idea. I just one to install Airport Extreme to my G4 desktop computer so my wife can connect wireless to the Internet using her portable PC.

[edit] I removed what I had said here earlier since it was based on a misreading of the situation.[/edit]

I think what he is trying to do is add an airport extreme card into his G4, then wants to connect the ethernet port to his cable/dsl modem and use internet connection sharing to allow his wife to connect ad-hoc through his G4.

This should work, I have done it with my powerbook at work to allow my axim to connect to the internet.

Ah - sorry, I had misread/misunderstood before.
So if you indeed have installed an Airport Card inside your G4 computer and want to share your Internet connection via Airport, then you need to do as carousal has suggested and go into Sharing Preferences and turn on Internet Sharing.

In your Network Preferences, you want to make sure that the Ethernet port appears higher up (earlier in the list) than the Airport in the list of Network configurations. That will ensure that your G4 continues to use Ethernet for its own Internet connection.

I note that using Airport in this way to share an Internet connection was the subject of at least one article on the main macosxhints site - so searching there might be useful.

But note also that this is not the best way to share an Internet connection between two or more computers. The best way is to have a separate box (a "router") that all of the computers connect to. None of the computers would connect directly to the modem - only the router would connect to the modem. This has the advantage of a dedicated box that is on all of the time and which supplies an extra layer of separation between you and the wild Internet.

FWIW, I was unsuccessful at sharing an internet connection wirelessly from my internal Airport Extreme card to a PC. My local Macs could use the shared signal, but not the PC.

That might be related to the encryption (security) you used for that network.

I think it was. The problem is that it appears you can't change the encryption from WEP to WPA. I have mentioned in a previous thread that you seem to need WPA for an XP machine to connect to the network. This may be different for other XP setups.

I thought the Apple Extreme Base was a router box, guess I was totally wrong for what I read in here.

Well, if you do in fact have an Airport Extreme Base Station, then you should be able to do what you want:

1.) Connect the ethernet cable from your "Alcatel Speed Touch Home" to the uplink or WAN port on the back of the AEBS
2.) Connect one end of another Ethernet cable to the LAN port on the back of the AEBS, and the other end to your G4 (your G4 should be able to connect to the internet at this point)
3.) *this step is presumably finished* equip your Sony PC with a wireless 802.11b/g card of some sort.
4.) establish an Airport Network using the Airport Setup Assistant (located in /Applications/Utilities/ on your G4). Be sure to use WPA security as you may run into difficulties connecting from the PC if you set it to something else (like WEP).


Once the Airport Network is established, you should be able to connect to the internet wirelessly from the PC, but I have no idea how to help you with that part.

There has been much confusion since we weren't sure if you had an Airport Extreme card (to put into your G4) or an Airport Extreme Basestation.
zeb has explained how to hook up the latter.

I have an Airport Extreme Basestation but noty and Airport Extreme card because I was told don't need one ofr my G4 because is not the computer I want to connect wireless. My wife PC is the one I one to be able to connect via Apple Airport, my wife PC have a wireless 802.11b/g card.
I done the steps the ZEB told me to connect the ethernet cable from the "Alcatel Speed Touch Home" to the uplink or WAN port on the back of the
AEBS and connect one end of another Ethernet cable to the LAN port on the back of the AEBS, and the other end to your G4. But when I do that I cannot connect to the Internet and when I try to use Airport Setup Assistant does not recognize I have the Airport Extreme Basestation install.
Is that I was told wrong and I'm missing the Airport card in my G4 even tho that my G4 will not be connected to the internet wireless??????

No - you don't need an Airport card in your G4.
What you have done so far sounds correct.

I assume that the Airport basestation is plugged in. What lights are showing on the front of it?

Please tell us what your Network preferences are set to. In particular is Ethernet at the top of the list of "Network Port configurations"?
And what does it say in the "Network Status" section?

The "Network Status" section says the following: Built-in Ethernet is set up to use PPPoe. Built-in Ethernet is connected and have the IP address xx.xx.xxx.xx. You are connected to the Internet via Built-in Ethernet.
The TCP/IP Configure IPv4 Using PPP The PPPoE connect using PPPoE Service provider Fast Access DSL Ethernet configure Automatically

Is that the information your asking for??

Ah - good job on relaying the info. Quite useful.
I see from the above that your G4 used to be set up to do PPPoE - this is something that is needed for most DSL connections. Sometimes the modem handles it, but I guess not in your case.

Since your G4 is now no longer connected directly to the modem, you don't want it to do the PPPoE any more. So uncheck that option in Network preferences. You want the Ethernet settings to say "configure IPv4: Using DHCP".

And then you need to tell the Airport basestation that it needs to do the PPPoE. Launch the "Airport Admin" utility and you should see one entry already selected - that is your basestation. It probably is listed as IP address 10.0.0.1 or something like that. Press the Configure button in the toolbar and a new window should open.
In this new window, go into the "Internet" section and set the "Connect Using" to "PPP over PPPoE" and fill in the information requested - like your DSL account name and password etc.
(You can see the DSL account name in your current Network preferences but you will have to remember what the DSL password is - it usually is on a paper that your ISP sent to you. Otherwise you may need to phone your ISP to get your password changed etc.)

I will try that one but the problem so far is that I have not been able to launch and use the Airport Setup Assistant each time I try I get the following message: "No new AirPort networks were found
Please make sure your AirPort Base Station is plugged in, in range of your computer, and then click Continue to scan again."
and I cannot pass from that screen to continue with the set up.

One thing you can try is to turn off the firewall in your G4's Sharing preferences. That is always a good idea (as a temporary measure) when you are having trouble connecting with some network device.

You should read the Airport Extreme manual that came with your AEBS.
Here's a PDF copy of it:
http://manuals.info.apple.com/en/Air...SetupGuide.pdf
I note that it recommends using the "AirPort Setup Assistant" instead of "Airport Admin" when setting up the AEBS the first time.

Somewhere in that manual it should tell you how to reset the AEBS. This is usually done by pressing a small recessed button on the AEBS. I have heard of some cases where multiple resets (e.g. 3 times) were needed before the AEBS showed up in Airport Admin.

Note that some of the instructions might assume that you are connected to the AEBS wirelessly (i.e. using an Airport Card) but this is not necessary and in fact it is better to be connected via Ethernet like you are.

The firewall always been OFF and reset the AEBS few times but will try few more times and see what happen.

What lights are showing on the Airport Base Station?

See description of the lights in this Airport troubleshooting guide:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106858

The middle light is steady on the other 2 are flicking on and off

According to this Apple doc:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=107457
that should mean that it is working properly and receiving some wireless traffic as well as some Ethernet traffic.

Check to make sure that you have the Ethernet cable from your G4 plugged into the "LAN" jack and the Ethernet cable from the modem plugged into the WAN jack on the AEBS (Airport Extreme Base Station). See the AEBS manual that I linked to in a previous posting (above) to identify which is which.

And are you now trying to use the "AirPort Setup Assistant" ? As I pointed out above, that seems to be what Apple recommends for the first setup instead of "Airport Admin".

I have not been able to launch and use the Airport Setup Assistant each time I try I get the following message: "No new AirPort networks were found
Please make sure your AirPort Base Station is plugged in, in range of your computer, and then click Continue to scan again."
and I cannot pass from that screen to continue with the set up.

Okay, maybe the "Airport Setup Assistant" is intended for setup of a machine that has an Airport card.
Let's go back to trying "Airport Admin" instead.
What happens when you run it? Does it see the basestation (over Ethernet)?

If it doesn't show up as an entry that you can select and then press the Configure toolbar button, then try the following:
Press the toolbar button labeled "Other". A dialog will pop up asking for IP address and password. I think the default IP address will be filled in as 10.0.1.1 - leave it as this. Use a password of "public" (without the quotes).
Does that work?

And please check again what it says in your Network preferences - the Ethernet section. What does it say for IP address? And verify that the PPPoE is turned off there and that it is set to use DHCP. What does the status show as?