[wkenspen]

Has anyone tried this one? I looking to upgrade from my silver Airport. Somethiing faster and with better range. Available at Amazon for $100 vs Airport Extreme base station for $250... Please advise.

[ftaok]

There's no point to going with the 624 router as your PowerBook won't be able to take advantage of the 108 Mbps ratings. I think your Mac will just throttle down to 54 Mbps.
The Netgear 614 is a 54 Mbps router and it works fine with Macs.
Caveat - If you have PC's as well as your Mac, the PC's can use the 108 speeds, as long as you buy the right cards for the PCs.

[wkenspen]

Thanks for the advise. Have also been browsing the D-Link products. Do you have a preference?

[ftaok]

I've never used any D-link products, so I can't say.
But I do have the Netgear 614 802.11g router. It's worked perfectly with my iBook (Airport) and my wife's PC laptop. I got a Netgear card for her computer.
Setup is a snap and I'm able to use WEP with it. I don't think there's an update for WPA, but that might be coming.
The best thing about the unit is that it's tiny. It's like 7"x4"x1". Plus, it's pretty cheap. I got it at Amazon for $70 after rebate. It might be cheaper now, though.

[wkenspen]

What is the problem with PB not being able to connect at 108 Mbps? Is it Apple's pre-installed Airport Extreme G card? If so, could on use one of Netgear's or D-Link's PCI cards? Thanks much for you replies.

[ftaok]

Airport Extreme uses the standard 802.11g protocol. This is rated for 54 Mbps. Netgear's 624 router uses their own special version of 802.11g which can go to 108 Mbps.
I guess you could pop a Netgear card into your PowerBook and use it, but I don't know if there are drivers for it. Besides, you probably don't want the antenna sticking out of your PB when you use it.
Personally, I don't think that the 108 Mbps is worth it. 54 Mbps is pretty fast and cable or DSL doesn't reach those speeds.
But if you're hellbent on 108, you might want to check with Netgear (or D-Link, Linksys, etc) to see if their "turbo" products are supported on the Mac.

[d00d]

Actually regular 802.11b itself overshadows the speed of any DSL or cable modem connection.

[wkenspen]

Thanks much for all the advice! I'll go with the 54 Mbps router.

[fieldenlundy]

I have a Ti with Airport, my son has an iBook with Airport, my wife has a PC with a wireless adapter. All use a Netgear WGR614 to connect to the Internet and use e-mail. This works just fine.
Now I'm ready to set up WEP and then an internal network. I can't figure how to do this from my Mac. So far, Netgear has not been helpful. Is this an operation that must be done from a PC?
Any help or reading or internet site suggestions welcomed.
Thanks

[ftaok]

WEP is easy with the Netgear. Here's what you need to do.
1. It's easiest to plug in one of your computers to set it up since after you've set the WEP, you'll be locked out until you've typed in the password. So just plug the ethernet to one of your computers and you're set.
2. Choose 128-bit WEP for best protection. Make sure you only use Key 1, since the Macs only support the first key. Type in a 26 character passkey or use the self-generating passphrase to develop one for you.
3. Make sure you write down or copy-paste the 26-character passkey.
4. On the Macs, select your Network and a password dialog box should show up. Type in the passkey in the correct box (NOTE - you may need to put a $ or # in front of the passkey for the Macs). Let Keychain memorize your passkey for easy access.
5. On the PC, do you have a Netgear adapter or some other kind? If it's a Netgear, dowin in the system tray, there's a Netgear "do-hickey". Select that and click on the Encrytion tab. Enter the correct passkey into the correct slot.
That should get you started.