Airport Extreme Base Station as Extender to Airport Extreme Time Machine

Question

I have tried this a few times, but to no avail: Tonight I purchased an Airport Extreme Base Station (AE) to set up as an extender to my Airport Extreme Time Capsule (AETC).  The Airport Utility finds the router and goes through set-up seemingly fine, with green lights on both.  Then shortly after (within a minute) the AE reboots on it's own, followed by the AETC rebooting (again, on it's own) and this occurs repeatedly.  I reset the AE completely and run through the set-up and the same thing occurs.  I've also done soft resets to the AETC.  Long and short of it - the restarting discontinues once I unplug the power cord from the AE.  Then the AETC resumes as it has - providing fine wifi and speed.  It appears the AE rebooting on its own makes the AETC reboot.  Any ideas?  Thanks!

Answer 1

howto - extending airport 802.11n networks
Pre-Requistites
1) Ensure all have most recent firmware - 7.7.3 for AC devices, 7.6.4 for 802.11n devices
2) Have most recent Airport Utility (OS X 10.7 thru 10.9, use 6.3.2, IOS6/7 use 1.3.3)
3) Only have the Primary Airport/TimeCapsule powered on for now
Set up the Primary/Anchor Airport Base Station
1) Do this over ethernet - ensure that the Modem and TimeCapsule/Airport is connected on the WAN port
2) You'll be prompted by Airport Utility to name the Network and the Base Station
Network is the SSID of the Wireless LAN
BaseStation is the name of the Airport/TimeCapsule
3) You'll be prompted for a password - this will be for both the WLAN and the Base Station on initial setup
Note here - there are at least three passwords to worry about post setup
a) BaseStation Management - in this how-to, this will be carried thru to the extended basestations
b) WLAN Access
c) Disk Access for TimeCapsule and AirDisk
They can be same or unique, up to you...
Configure the Airport/TimeCapsule for WiFi/Network
4) Select the named BS in Airport Utility - click the 'edit' button
5) Review 'Base Station' Tab
5a) BaseStation Name
5b) BaseStation Password - you can change this now if desired, this does not affect WLAN password
6) Review Internet Tab
6a) set as appropriate for your network - e.g DHCP or other depending on needs
6aa) focus here is getting the primary BS set up first
6b) Click Internet Options - this is IPV6 setup - for now...
6ba) Set to Link-Local Only, click save, you can go back and change this later if needed
7) Go to Wireless Tab
7a) Set Network Mode to "Create a wireless network"
7b) Check Wireless Network Name
7c) Wireless Security - recommend WPA2 Personal - this is important as you'll need this later
7d) Wireless Password - the password entered in step 5b above is what is used here, feel free to modify or not - if so, note this
7e) disregard Enable Guest Network for now
7f) Click Wireless Options
7g) ensure 5Ghz network name is unselected
7h) Country as appropriate - since I'm in California, I choose United States
7i) Leave 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz Channels as "Automatic" for now, click save if needed
8) Click Network Tab
8a) if this is your primary router - use DHCP and NAT
8b) Click Network Options
8c) DHCP Lease - I use 12 hours
8d) IPv4 DHCP Range - every here is a bit different, but my recommendation for most folks
192.168.1.100 to 150
Use what works for you, keeping in mind that the AP Extreme, TimeCapsule, and 2012 Airport Express can handle 50 clients, max
8e) Ensure that Enable NAT Port Mapping Protocol is selected
8f) can worry about Enable default host at: [] later, this is the DMZ'ed host
8g) can choose to enable IGMP Snooping or not - doesn't affect the primary setup
8h) click save
TimeCapsule Only - for Airport Extreme, worry about AirDisk later
This is TimeMachine support, along with FileShares
9) Select Disks - you should see a partitiion named "Data"
9a) ensure that Enable file sharing is selected
9b) ensure that Share disks over WAN is unchecked for now
9c) Secure Shared Disks:
Choices here -
device password - noted in step 5b above
disk password - this will be for all LAN clients that can see the Data Partitiion
accounts - you can set up separate users and passwords - this is beyond scope of this how-to
Recommendation if using as TimeMachine only, use a disk password - note this as you'll need it for timemachine on the clients
Save Settings to the Airport/TimeCapsule
10) Click the "update' button
The Airport/TimeCapsule will restart
Everything now should show green and shiny - open a web browser and attempt to go to Apple/Google/Yahoo, to ensure that you've got network connectivity
Reviewing things in the Airport 6.3 utility, you should see your base station and the Internet - both with green status
Once done here, let's extend the Wireless Network
Note - again, it helps to be connected to the primary base station on ethernet, wireless makes things, erm, challenging
11) with another decive - Mac/iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch or PC, ensure that Wireless LAN is working on the primary AP/Basestation
Once this is done, then proceed to the next step
Enable the "Extended" Airport - can be another TimeCapsule, Airport Express or Airport Extreme
For purposes of this discussion - assume all ore 802.11n capable at a minimum, so this applies towards more recent gear
a) Airport Extreme AC (2013)
b) Airport TimeCapsule AC (2013)
c) Airport Express 2012 Dual-Band (Looks like AppleTV)
d) Airport Extreme 802.11n 5th Gen, TimeCapsule 4th Gen
e) Airport Express 802.11n - similar to the 802.11g variant, looks like a MacBook Pro power adapter
Assumptions here is that the extended airport is factory defaults - see link below for more info:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3728
Once this is done, plug in the Airport that is intended for extending the wireless network
after about a minute or so, you should see a blinking orange light, this is normal...
In Airport Utility, you should see in the upper left hand, "Other Wi-Fi Devices (1)" - click this, if you don't see this, exit and restart Airport Utility
12) clicking on the button, you should see an entry menu as "Airport Extreme xxxxxx", select this
13) Once selected, you'll see "This Airport Extreme/Express/TimeCapsule will be set up to extend "Primary Base Station"
14) Enter the name for this base station - it should be unique from the name of the Primary noted in step 5a
15) Click "next"
16) Should see "setting up this base station to wirelessly extend..."
you'll see some progress messages.. this is the two basestations handshaking....
If successful, you'll see the BaseStation named in step 14 as "is now wireless extending "base station named in (step 5a)"
STOP - the Airport is now extended, repeat steps 11 thru 16 for each addtional Airport
For advanced features - such as port forwarding, DMZ, IPv6 Tunnels, Back to my Mac, etc - perform this only on the Primary Base station outlined in steps 1 thru 8h
Good Luck!