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General discussion

Wireless Compatibility Headaches - Please Help!

by johnacruz Feb 19, 2006 10:00AM PST

On: 15" Powerbook G4, 1GHz, 512 SDRAM, OS X 10.4.4.

I'm a bit new at the wireless business so please bear with me.

Ok so I'm in Tokyo, I've got a broadband a/c set up and I wanted to get it wireless because there are two people using it, both on Macs, so they sent me another rental modem and a wireless card.
The modem is a Fujitsu W4 and the card is a Laneed LD-WL54G/CB.

At the moment the Airport Extreme on my mac is picking up NOTHING. I'm guessing either the card just isn't compatible or there's something I'm not doing...

I know the modem is happy with mac because I'm using it now via LAN cable.

Should I go to Aki and try and find a new card to swap it with? Is it likely that I can get any wireless card that's compatible with mac, and throw it in the modem and have it working? Or is it not that simple?

Any advice (or explanation of how these things work) would be much appreciated

Discussion is locked

6 Posts
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Wireless
by mrmacfixit Forum moderator Feb 19, 2006 8:56PM PST

On the Mac. Does the system profiler report a wireless card being installed?
Did you install the Airport card or did it come already installed. If you, check that everything is connected, including the antenna.
Does anyone else see a wireless signal from the Wireless router/modem?
Is the wireless router configured correctly.
Is the wireless part of the router actually turned on. On some routers this is not turned on by default.
As long as the wireless router is pushing out 802.11b/g than the Extreme should see something. All wireless cards operate on the same frequency band which is why is is always a good idea to secure your wireless network.

P

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Wireless Compatibility Headaches - Please Help!
by johnacruz Feb 20, 2006 11:01AM PST

Ok, so on the Mac, Airport is all ok. I can see it in System Profiler and in the Menu bar. I can also log onto other people's networks with no problems.

At the moment I can't check if anyone else gets the signal, because I don't know anyone around here with a Windows notebook...

As for configurations, I have no idea whether I'm supposed to configure anything, as all the manuals are in Japanese. It can with a driver CD for windows, too, which is also completely in Japanese. Do you normally configure a card via a connected P.C.? Is that how that works?

Oh and one other thing - I tried putting the said card into the P.C. slot in my Powerbook, and it didn't even recognise it was there. I'm not sure what that means, but there you go anyway.

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Configuration
by mrmacfixit Forum moderator Feb 20, 2006 11:10AM PST

It is normal to configure a Wireless router by using a hard wired machine to connect to it.
There should be little or no configuration to be done on the Mac and putting the PC card into the slot is just a waste of time. The only thing the Mac needs is to receive a signal from the wireless router/modem.
Currently you cannot prove that there is a wireless signal coming from that device. You have also proved that you have no problem with your Wireless Extreme card by its ability to log onto other wireless networks.

Back to the Router/Modem as the source of the problem. Do you know anyone who speaks and reads both languages?

P

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Wireless Compatibility Headaches - Please Help!
by johnacruz Feb 20, 2006 6:59PM PST

Yeah I do - I guess that could be my only hope...

Failing that I'm thinking that it might be worth it in the long run to get myself an airport base station, and connect that to the modem... that would surely fix my problems, right?

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Surely would
by mrmacfixit Forum moderator Feb 20, 2006 8:48PM PST

as would most of the ones I have seen here in the US.
The wireless signals used by the Mac are no different than those used by the Windows world.
Belkin and Netgear both make wireless routers that work quite happily with the Mac.

I'm still not convinced that there is actually anything coming out of your wireless setup.

Good Luck, let us know how you get on.

P

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Use internet sharing
by iburkhart13 Feb 26, 2006 1:19AM PST

You can use internet sharing if all else fails which would make one computer the host and connect it via ethernet and then the other computer would be wireless use its airport card assuming that they both have a airport card.

Ian

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