Mac Airport Problem
 

Hey all,

My Airport used to work great for sharing my internet wirelessly with my ThinkPad running Windows XP. Ever since we upgraded to Leopard, though, I can't make the XP machine connect to the wireless network. The PC shows the Airport network in the wireless networks viewer, but it times out when trying to connect to the network. I've searched pretty tirelessly online trying to find something, but I've had no luck. If anyone can help me out, I'd appreciate it greatly.

Thanks!

Do you have WEP enabled?

Are you using the Airport Utility to configure the Airport or are you using Internet Connection Sharing?

OS X firewall on?

Just internet connection sharing. I don't think I have the firewall turned on. Under airport security of the network I have set up, it says "none."

WEP encryption is on on the Mac, though I've tried it both ways and had no luck either way.

I had some serious problems getting the airport to work with any PC I had...finally gave up and bought a linksys wireless modem ....then got rid of the last remaining PC in the house for a mac lol...still use linksys tho :shrug:

I have a friend at work who is a super mac enthusiast and even he admits that he's had nothing but problems with his Airport. In fact, he set it up to automatically reboot like once a day because it is so bad. Actually, I had the same experience with the first wireless router I bought - a Belkin. I bought a Buffalo brand router for $50 and have had zero issues with it.

I should add that this is an airport extreme card in a g5, not an external airport.

You might check and see if your firewall is turned on, as that may be blocking your internet connection sharing. I've even seen it do that when the firewall is set to allow access for internet sharing. Make sure it's off at least to test it.

Okay. I'll try it when I get home tonight.

Check your Internet Sharing options and make sure the channel is not set to Automatic. Airport devices set to auto can be on channels 1-13. XP boxes can usually only handle channels 1-11. Airports set to auto usually pick channel 13 when set to auto, and it sometimes screws with XP boxes that can't use that channel. Try setting the channel manually to 11.

And I'd turn WEP off during testing. Just to make sure that's not the problem.

Ahh. That's good to know and could definitely be an issue. I'm fairly sure that channel is currently set to automatic.

WEP is off. Firewall is off. Channel is set to 11.

Still no luck. :(

New info:

I tried to launch my airport utility to follow a hunch from the airport utility help. When I do and scan, it doesn't pick up any wireless devices. Shouldn't it be picking up my airport so I can configure it?