As some of you all might know if you have me in your iChat buddy list, you probably saw me bounce on and off a lot last night..and if I talked to you, you definately know how pissed I was! <br><br>Here is the situation:<br>I purchased an open-box Airport base station (yeah yeah, I know now what a bonehead move that was!) from an auction site on Amazon (yeah yeah..again..another bonehead move).<br><br>I received it yesterday..a nice white one that is only a month old (manufactured 11/02) and it had all of the stuff needed..and no visible damage.<br><br>So I open up the instruction booklet and follow along. Oops..problem #1. I use Airport Setup Assistant in Utilities like it says and it can't find the Network. Bummer...yes, the card was turned on and the cable was connected in the WAN port on the base station.<br><br>So, after talking to a friend who is local, he said I had to call my ISP (it's cable) and let them know about my new MAC address. So I called Insightbb and sure enough, they had to do some changes. Eventually, after convincing the guy that he could help me, they had it set up on their end..they could ping my base station. But still no go on connections. <br><br>So then I call Apple...wait wasn't that long, but boy, I'm sure glad I didn't purchase through the education cause that was one of the 1st questions..that and if I had the AppleCare warranty. So anyways, finally talked to someone and this guy was totally clueless! I had to tell him how to do some stuff! <br><br>So eventually it was decided that I needed to hit the reset button on the back of the base station...and upon completion of that, I was connected! Great! I was happy and we hung up......<br><br>Only to be disconnected 10 minutes later!! So I tried everything again..same thing..then I hit the reset switch and lo and behold! I was connected! woohoo!<br><br>Then..disconnected yet again..bummer. So I hit the reset again..and went into the Airport Admin Utility in Utilities and it said that the base station had been reset and I needed to enter a new password and verify it. So I did..and it updated and promptly disconnected me! So I tried again..tried everything..nothing..so hit the reset switch yet again...and got connected....<br><br>And then I called Apple..while on hold forever this time after it was determined by them that I didn't have the AppleCare, I was disconnected again!! So while talking to the guy at Apple..told him all what was going on..and he couldn't help me. Said that it was more than likely that it was my base station as a new one shouldn't have to be reset all that time..even once was more than normal!<br><br>So now here we go with customer support with the business I bought it from..which is in TN..not that far for me to drive if necessary and toss it through their window! LOL<br><br>I sent in an email and described all the above...and got a reply:<br>Dear Valued Customer,<br><br>To better assist you, please provide an auction (eBay customers) or a<br>listing ID number (for Amazon customers). We will be happy to assist you<br>once we get the information requested. If you have any other questions<br>feel free to ask. Thanks and we look forward to serving you soon.<br><br>So I did..and got this reply:<br>The ups tracking number you requested is XXXXX. You can<br>review the status at www.ups.com. If you have any other questions feel<br>free to ask.<br><br>Thank You,<br><br>Customer Service <br><br>So, I sent them an email which contained the copied part of my first one..which got this:<br><br>Dear Valued Customer,<br><br>To better assist you, please provide an auction (eBay customers) or a<br>listing ID number (for Amazon customers). We will be happy to assist you<br>once we get the information requested. If you have any other questions<br>feel free to ask. Thanks and we look forward to serving you soon.<br><br><br>OH boy...can you see the steam rising off of my head??<br><br>BTW, I forgot, yeah, all my settings in Network in Sys. prefs were set to Airport and all that..<br><br><br>So guys, any ideas?<br><br><br>[color:red]Kiss My Banana!</font color=red>

I dunno, could it be your ISP that is the problem and not the Airport? Is it dialup or are you on cable? Of course if you had internet before and didn't get disconneted frequently like you are being disconnected now with the Airport, it must be something with the base station. My three year old base station works like a charm and I never get disconnected unless of course the cable goes out. Gee, I don't know what to tell you really. Have you checked all the Help files in Airport Admin? Maybe you can find some answers there. Good luck, hope you get things resolved. <br><br>

I have three airport base stations and for the most part they have worked flawlessly. Yes, they are more expensive then other wireless access points but few third party wireless access points have a built-in 56k modem and none of the others have such well designed, easily configured software as Apple's Airports. It's incumbent upon you to ensure you have the latest Airport software installed and the newer snow base stations have had at least one very important "firmware" update since being released. I suspect since you can at least get connected for a short time, your issues are software related and/ or you're not configuring it properly. It sounds like you might be on a cable modem so to resolve the MAC address you generally simply power down the base station and cable modem. Unplug your cable modem from the wall for at least 5 or 10 minutes and power up in the reverse sequence. Make sure your cable modem is DIRECTLY plugged into your Airport's WAN port and not the LAN port. This should allow the cable modem to renew it's lease on your Airport's base station MAC address instead of that on your computers.<br><br>Apple has beautifully designed troubleshooting guides on Airport as well as well written manuals for designing Airport networks. <br><br>Should your issues continue go to Apple's support site http://www.info.apple.com/ <br><br>and search for document #<br><br>106858<br><br>Let us know how you make out...<br><br>Rox<br><br>

Yowza... that sucks! I'll have to agree with Roxie... first thing is look for the software updates and the firware updates (there have been several this past year, and two in the last 3 or 4 months). I know a few of them were for the Snow AP only. This sounds like something isn't configured right. The Airport has a lot of options and many of them don't make any sense to someone who doesn't know a lot about TCP/IP networking. I wouldn't mind getting one of those Airport for Dummies kind of books... maybe you could grab a copy to assist with your problem.<br><br><br>Visit me here!

I'll have to go find it..<br><br>Here's the thing..my ISP, Insight, which is RoadRunner in other states, is kinda strange I think. When I got this powerbook, it wouldn't access the internet..had to configure it online at my ISP's page...<br><br>So I had to call Insight and configure this ABS with them and gave them the new MAC address..<br><br>So I don't know if I want to go through the headaches of calling Insight again to configure this with them again..<br><br>And I have also found out...that it's either Airport or ethernet....seems that I couldn't just disconnect the base station and hook right back up to the cable modem and go. Which would be a royal pain in the butt.<br><br>So what I'm thinking of doing is buying 20 feet of ethernet cable and running it to the other rooms...<br><br><br><br>[color:blue]This poster is too lame to come up with his own sig...so he stole another one</font color=blue><br><br>

Well do keep in mind you WAN And LAN ports on the snow base station will both have UNIQUE MAC addresses. Be sure you are giving out the right one. The manuals that can be downloaded can and will be enormously helpful. They're written in concise, clear english and you should have no problem. <br><br>

Give you $20 for the basestation that is useless to you.<br><br><br><br>Sorry to hear that the problems seem to be continuing with no resolution yet. <br><br>

Riiiiiiiiiiggggggggghhhhhhhhhttttt...<br><br>I would rather sell it on eBay first and get more than $20! <br><br><br><br>[color:blue]This poster is too lame to come up with his own sig...so he stole another one</font color=blue><br><br>

Well, I took the base station to the local mac store here and they tested it out. Apparently it was bad..and it is covered under warranty! <br><br>So when they get it back, I'm taking it to eBay and selling that sucker and either buying a Linksys router/wireless or keeping this 20ft of ethernet cable <br><br><br>[color:red]Don't make me open this on you!</font color=red><br>

THanks to Linksys, I am now wireless! Seems my base station was bad so Apple replaced it. But in the meantime I bought this Linksys router and it works wonderfully...and so easy to set up!! <br><br><br>[color:red]Don't make me open this on you!</font color=red><br>