IMac Newbie - Airport to WIFI printer help

Question

I've just bought a Lexmark printer to go with my core duo intel iMac. The printer has WIFI and I thought I might be able to connect it through Airport?
It has USB if I have to use it, but wireless would be awesome.
I've got no idea about Airport as I'm a recent PC convert since my mate sold me his iMac.
I did try to create a network but I wasn't really sure what I was doing.... Passwords and hex and all that and then not knowing how to change or delete a network I may have created - too much in one night for a newbie.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

Ah, okay. Well, no, you're right, you can do what you describe. Here's how.
First, find out from the printer's documentation what kind of encryption type it supports. You'll be looking for the phrase "WEP" or ideally "WPA" or "WPA2".
Next, on the Mac, go to System Preferences, Sharing, and Internet Sharing.
For "Share your connection from" choose your (USB?) device.
For "To computers using" choose "Airport". Then set up a wireless network name and choose the appropriate encryption type that the printer will support. As I say, ideally this will be WPA or WPA2, and choose a good 8-character password. If you're using WPA/WPA2, you don't need to worry about hex characters (that's an old WEP scheme).
Now you have a wireless network, and you should follow your printer's instructions to join it. Your Mac will essentially be the "wireless router" or "gateway" and its IP will be 192.168.2.1; your printer's IP address will probably be 192.168.2.2, but you should try to allow it to get an IP address automatically.
Let us know if that works.
Matt