Cannot configure Airport Extreme Base Station

I have a base station in my classroom. It was plugged in 4 years ago stock, and it has run fine as is all this time. I started to get annoyed about temporary signal drops that occurred from time to time. I was told that updating the firmware would limit these (but not eliminate them)......and now my problem. I tried both airport utilities to no avail. Both give me error messages ("an error occurred reading the configuration") when every I try to set it up. I did a hard reset, but that did not alleviate the problem. I know the default password is "public".....not sure what to do from here. Any suggestions?
The base station is running firmware 5.0.3....which is quite old. My laptop is a G3 iBook running 10.48.
Interestingly the router still works pretty well.....I am using it right now to get on my school network...but I would like to put a password on it and update the firmware.
Thanx
Shawn

Shawn, I'm having the same problem, exactly. I had to disconnect my networked HD for a while (renovations) and when I plugged it back in, I couldn't see the ethernet port. When I went to Airport Admin. Utility, I couldn't configure the airport base station.
I went through the "cold start" procedures and used "public" but to no avail. I still have access to the 'net but am concerned that my security has defaulted to -0-.
I am going to try to direct connect tonight when I get home, but if you have luck, would you please post your answer? I will do the same tonight if I figure it out.
I've been pulling my hair out for a week trying to figure this out!!
Good luck.
Thanks,
Dave

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