Printing wirelessly to MacBook Pro with Airport Extreme Base Station

Question

I have an Airport Extreme Base Station that I used to use wirelessly until I got Verizon Fios. The Fios technicians said the base station couldn't be used and so it's been sitting unused for a few months. However, I really, really miss printing wirelessly, and was wondering if it was possible to use the Airport Extreme Base Station ONLY to print wirelessly, and not connect it any way to my internet (I don't want to mess with any of the fios stuff at all).
If it's not possible, is there any other way to print wirelessly without purchasing another product or special printer. I have a HP c4480 printer.
Thanks!

Answer 1

If your printer has a USB cable the easy way to go about this in my opinion is to plug that USB cable into your Extreme base station. I have the Extreme ABS that looks like a flying saucer. I plug the usb cable into the port that has the symbol that doe NOT look like this <--> rather it looks like a Saguaro cactus.
My computer then sends print documents to the Extreme via WiFi and then Extreme sends them to the printer via the USB cable.
If your Airport status is not showing in the Mac's menubar go to system Prefs/Network/Airport and check a little box so it will show up in the menu bar.
Now if your Extreme is plugged in the wall and powered up your Mac should be able to find it. Click on that menubar item for Airport and scroll down and select your Airport Extreme. I don't know for sure what its name will be. It should still be the same as it used to be when you used it last.
Now try printing a simple document. In the print dialog window you should be able to select what printer you want to use. If your new Extreme printer is listed select it. You may need to click on Print & Fax and figure out how to select it from there, and choose it to be the new default printer.
I think this info will do the job. Whenever you want to print you have to go to the Airport icon in the menubar and change your airport connection from your Verizon stuff to your Extreme. Then of course you have to change back when you are done. That is why it would be great to toss the Verizon WiFi radio out the window and just plug your Verizon modem into your Extreme WiFi radio transceiver (router). But I understand you cannot deal with that at this time.
If this does not do the job, if I have missed something, I will bet you 5 bucks that you can still figure it out if you just look at any error messages and/or look at the Print&Fax prefs and the Print dialog windows etc. and see what I may have missed. Maybe you have to go to SystemPrefs/Sharing and allow your printer to be shared. I don't think so. The way I figure any of this stuff out is to just look at stuff and think and try things and see what happens.
Your Verizon setup should be something like this.... a cable comes into your house and goes to a 'modem'. From there and ethernet cable (CAT-5 cable) goes from that modem to your Verizon router (WiFi radio transceiver).
As for getting rid of the Verizon router, when you are ready to give it a go, simply unplug the ethernet cable (it has a plug on the end that looks like the kind of plug that telephones use to plug into the wall, except it is a bit wider, but still has that same kind of snap-lock tab) that comes from the Verizon modem (the modem has the heavy round cable and probably many blinking lights) and plug it into the Extreme. Mine has an icon on the Extreme that is many dots in a circular pattern.
At this point you may have to unplug the Verizon modem form the wall AC power and the Extreme also. Then plug them back in, wait a minute, go to your Airport icon on your Mac menubar, Select Extreme and start surfing the web.
It really is that simple with a Mac. Maybe Verizon has found a way to make things difficult but my guess is no. Any password should be taken care of in your Airport Setup Utility program. It should be the same password(s) as you used before when you used your Extreme.