Apple AirPort Extreme Base Station MB053LL/A [OLD VERSION]
by Apple Computer
![Apple AirPort Extreme Base Station MB053LL/A [OLD VERSION]](/images/Apple-AirPort-Extreme-Base-Station-MB053LL-A-OLD-VERSION-B000UZCR56-L.jpg)
|
Our Price: $199.99 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $59.99 (click here) Category: CE See more product details |
|---|
Customers in the UK,
Buy this product at amazon.co.uk
for British Pounds
Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Apple AirPort Extreme Base Station MB053LL/A [OLD VERSION]
Customer Review: Serious shortcomings flaw this potentially wonderful router
Summary: 1 Stars
Update, June 5, 2008: With the release of new firmware for the router, and a couple of new releases of the Leopard operating system, the router provides much more stable access to the attached hard drive, at least from a Mac. It's still a bit iffy when attempting to read or write from an XP or Vista machine, though. I'd upgrade the rating from one to three stars, based on the improved performance. (End of update).
I purchased this router to add two capabilities to our home network: shared printing from PCs and Macs, and a shared USB hard drive. In switching from a Netgear router, I lost a lot of internet filtering features offered by Netgear, which are strangely absent on Apple's product. I guess they figure I'll add my own proxy server into the mix to handle that. What a pain! Using the USB port for a shared drive has been extremely unreliable, and it cannot be written to reliably from either of our Macbooks running Leopard or from our XP or Vista machines, either wirelessly or via a network cable. Yes, the printing works great. And the wireless coverage is very good--probably better than the Netgear router. I've also encountered problems when making configuration changes to the router, such as invoking hardware access control (MAC address). The router simply freezes up. I recommend against purchasing this product unless you'll be happy with basic router functionality and no shared hard drive.
Customer Review: Reliable router with great device sharing capability
Summary: 4 Stars
I bought this router to replace an old Linksys 54G SpeedBooster unit. It is no doubt expensive, compared with other options on the router market. This fact, combined with the lack of a web-based config utility make me deduct one star from my review. The range is great on this unit, and it has been stable so far for me. In N-only mode or connected-Ethernet mode, I notice a big uptick in performance. However, that speed increase suffers a little when you have mixed mode units. I was really frustrated with the unit after the initial purchase a few weeks back, mainly due to the buggy firmware/software combo and the lack of Time Machine integration. Also, Bonjour for Windows has problems seeing devices when it has to deal with VPN software. However, two big things happened: First, Apple updated the firmware to 7.3.1, which has made a HUGE difference. It is more stable and more importantly I can do Time Machine backups over the air to my WD hard drive. I now have a printer and an external HD connected via the Belkin MacMini 4-port USB hub to the AEBS. The setup works wonderfully (at least for now,) and Time Machine is fully functional wirelessly. I also found some great user forums on the Apple site that provide a very easy workaround for the shortcomings of Bonjour when dealing with VPNs. So, all in all, I am happy with things, now that Apple has fixed many of the firmware issues.Customer Review: You have to know its weak sides
Summary: 3 Stars
Apple AirPort Extreme Base Station (Gigabit) MB053LL/A
In general it seems like an aweseome router. It is one of the few out there that allows to reserve DHCP addresses by a mac address. User interface is really nice, but having a web config option would have been so much better.
I bought it to replace my old Buffalo router which seemed to lock up every time I tried to connect to a CISCO VPN from my mac book. This one performed beatifully.
The moment I ran into trouble was when I connected my IPTV box to it. Video would freeze after playing for a few seconds. I tried port mapping to no avail. I'm not sure if the problem was in a wired portion of the router or the firewall was blocking traffic it should not have. Unfortunately, the designers of the router did not give us too many options to influence its Firewall and QoS settings. I think it's a huge drawback, especially since now I'm stuck with a 10% restocking fee on a $179 router. I've waisted 3 nights trying to get it workingf to no avail.
I just bought a $40 Linksys WRT-54G and it works like a charm. It's not as fast and good looking, but it definitely is a lot more flexible in its configuration options. For the money Apple charges for this router, I would expect something of a slightly better design.
Customer Review: Awesome Router!
Summary: 5 Stars
I had a Linksys router before I purchased this one that served me well. However, I began getting too many signal drops. I decided it was time to purchase a new router. I thought this was going to be easy, but it wasn't. I purchased another Linksys router, but I kept getting a signal drop occasionally on my Macbook. It was driving me crazy. I returned it and purchased a D-Link router. I experienced the same problem - dropped signals. So, I bit my lip and bought the Apple Airport - the most money I ever spent on a router. I was at my wits end. Since this was my first Apple router, I wasn't going to wing it in installing it on my computers (a Windows Vista desktop, Dell laptop running Windows XP SP2, and Macbook) - so I called Apple support. Awesome support, let me tell you. The guy walked me through everything I needed to do to set up the router and get all the computer's connected to it. I also have my Canon printer connected through it through the USB port. It works fantastic as well! So far, and I had this router for about 4 months now, I received no dropped signal at all.
Also, let me mention that I have a Nintendo DS that I also use with this router and I've had no problem setting it up either.
Needless to say, I am EXTREMELY pleased with this purchase and definitely recommend this product.
Customer Review: A wonderful wireless router
Summary: 4 Stars
Normally a 802.11n wireless router should not cost more than $90. This Apple Extreme costs close to $180. What? Its price is almost two times more expensive than its competitors.
To be fair, those 'competitors' are not competitors when you put their specifications and this Extreme's specifications side-by-side. This wireless router has a USB port that allows you to print wirelessly to any printer with a USB port or to access files from a massive USB drive. A non-Apple router with similar specifications will eventually cost about the same.
Too bad that the latest Leopard's Time Machine does not allow wireless backup (yet) ... but this is another limitation hopefully to be improved by Apple soon.
I have to take one star off for this product despite its elegant design and wonderful engineering. Why? If you happen to use WPA (and you should) with a short password (less than or equal to 8 characters), the software (called AirPort Utility stored under ~/Applications/Utilities/) will keep complaining that you do not have a valid IP, even though you do. I spent quite a bit of time troubleshooting in the wrong direction as a result of this. I would expect the AirPort Utility software should have warned users of this often-overlooked requirement of WPA passwords [...]