[Macworld]

Post your comments for Charge it on your AirEx here

[BJWanlund]

Dan--
Could you also, say, plug a USB modem from AT&T or Sprint or similar in that USB port and create a wireless network that way? I'm just wondering.
BJ

[RosscoR]

The Airport basestations that have a built-in modem can do that, BJ, but not the Express.

[flybynight]

BJ - assuming that you are talking about a 3G modem from AT&T/Sprint/etc, the Airport Express lacks the software talk to the modem that way. It only supports printers.
But, if you want to share that connection with more than one computer, you should be able to turn on internet sharing on the computer that has the modem on it and create a wifi network from that.

[smax013]

RosscoR said:

The Airport basestations that have a built-in modem can do that, BJ, but not the Express.

Airport Extreme basestations do NOT have a built-in wireless modem. They do have a built-in WiFi chipset that allow you to create a WiFi network. Two completely different animals.

[dgal15]

Good tip indeed. When charging my 4th gen nano on an Airport Express G my iPod says it needs to be ejected. It appears to charge, but I find it a little weird that it needs to be ejected. Anyone else notice this?

[stephenrea]

SOME of the white UFO style Airport Extreme G base stations did have a modem, for sharing a dial-up connection, and allowing incoming connections to the network as well.
NONE of the more recent flat style Airport Extreme N base stations have a modem.
I really which Apple would give different names to different products.

[smax013]

stephenrea said:

SOME of the white UFO style Airport Extreme G base stations did have a modem, for sharing a dial-up connection, and allowing incoming connections to the network as well.

NONE of the more recent flat style Airport Extreme N base stations have a modem.

I really which Apple would give different names to different products.

To quote myself with some emphasis added:

Quote

Airport Extreme basestations do NOT have a built-in wireless modem. They do have a built-in WiFi chipset that allow you to create a WiFi network. Two completely different animals.

But, yes, the original Airport Basestations did have dial-up modems, but that is dramatically different than what the one poster asked about.

[RosscoR]

As I said, Airport base stations that have a built-in modem support it. I did not say that Airport Extreme base stations did. All the "clarifications" just end up confusing the issue. My answer to the original poster stands.

[smax013]

But that poster was asking about adding a mobile broadband wireless modem (aka "cellular" modem). That is dramatically different than a dial-up modem over a hardline that the original Basestations had.

And beyond that, even if the poster was asking about adding a dial-up USB modem to an Extreme Basestation, that cannot be done either (but, yes, an original Basestation could do THAT task...assuming you did not want 802.11n and could live with 802.11b or 802.11g).