Hey guys. my 2003 vintage Airport extreme has all three of its white lights flashing like crazy and cant be seen by any of my computers. I cant reconfigure or reset it by the computer only manually. It reset itself manually somehow so i reconfigured with the computer then it started flashing al three white lights like crazy and cant be seen by my computer. I think its shot its been acting messed up for a year so maybe i need a new one.
please help
thanks

Your base station is indicating a primary hardware failure. Sadly, its time to replace. However, on a good note, the Apple online store has the new ones refurbed for 149. Just got one myself

What is the advantage of an apple router vs. a $60 linksys one with linux installed? I wanted to get an apple one, but my budget would not allow, and it seems that the linksys with linux is just as stable.

With wireless N still only being a draft 'standard', you need to get all of your N kit from one vendor to be 100% certain of full compatibility and performance. Since the N cards in Macs are made by Apple, the AP Extreme is the only choice. Having said that, if you only want to share internet and small files between your machines, or you have one or more machines with g or b wireless cards then any router will suffice for your needs.
Personally, I like Netgear routers for their extra features (My old one had better wireless range than my current Airport basestation (UFO Extreme). I gather that linux based Linksys boxes are nice and hackable though.....

Linksys routers and linux is actually really nice, I have a custom kernel and all, and I have one that's been up for 154 days and its still running really stable.