Apple Airport Extreme 802.11n Gigabit Router Review
In light of our Independence Day, I too wished to declare a sort of independence. Not from the iron fist rule of a world super power, or for any particular rights; however, my declaration was far more nerdy. I hereby declare myself free from the slower speed, range, and bandwidth of my very old Linksys router. Ladies and gentlemen, enter the Apple Airport Extreme.
So this is basically a brief review of my experiences with the Apple Airport Extreme router. As a piece of networking hardware, I was a bit skeptical to stray from the standards and reputation set forth by Cisco/Linksys. I used to strictly purchase Linksys networking hardware, and it’s a well known fact that Cisco is what an enterprise company’s networking dreams are made of. Their unison was highly anticipated by the computing community, and it didn’t disappoint.
I wanted to give Apple a try though. Their “Bonjour” networking technology, afterall, is famous in the networking world for its simplicity. Plus, the hardware could be connected to multiple hard drives and printers via a USB interface (USB hub required for more than one device). This, in turn, provided all the computers on the network wireless printing and remote storage.
Ease of Configuration: 5/5
- In a phrase, this was an absolute breeze. My network consists of computers running Mac OS X Leopard, Windows XP, Windows Server 2008, and Ubuntu Linux, so I needed a router which could seamlessly network all of them. Most modern day routers have this ability, but the Airport Extreme was absolutely amazing. The Airport Utility (provided as a CD with the hardware) can be installed on Windows and OS X and allows users to remotely configure the router.
- I attached a USB printer to the router, and in all honestly, it took me less than ten minutes to configure five computers (two Linux, two Windows, and one Mac OS X).
- Though the router boasts four gigabit ethernet ports, one of them is dedicated for the WAN (for example, a cable/DSL modem connection). This only leaves three ports available for connection directly to computers, whereas most other routers have at least four. I wish there could have been five gigabit ports (1 for WAN and 4 for LAN).
- In terms of wireless range, the Airport Extreme doesn’t provide anything special. I’ve read other reviews saying that it exceeds the range of the previous generation Airport hardware; however, it’s no greater than my 802.11a/b Linksys router.
- Considering that this router is a print server, an external storage repository, a gigabit router, and an 802.11n wireless broadcaster, $200 isn’t bad at all. Also considering that this is a piece of Apple hardware, it was worth the expense. =).
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