Why is my airport extreme signal strength so weak on my macbook pro?

I live in a 4 story brownstone, next to neighbors with lots of wireless routers. My macbook pro (OS X 10.6.8) frequently is dropped from my airport extreme router. The strange thing is, the macbook receives a much stronger connection to my next door neighbor's wireless router (which is behind 2 brick walls, and down 1 floor) than it does to my airport extreme router - located 15 feet to my right with no interfering walls. In fact, I can stay solidly connected to my neighbor's router even when I'm 2 floors above him.
There are 4 other devices in my house connected to my airport extreme router. All have no problems connecting.
An ipad, which moves around from floor to floor, even outside on my front stoop.
A stationary imac located 4 inches away from the router
A stationary brother laser printer, about 10 feet to the right of the router (no interfering walls)
A stationary lexmark inket printer, about 10 feet in front of the router (behind 1 partition wall)
What can I do to troubleshoot this?

Problem solved. My router had some significant interference from a neighbours router that is no longer an issue.

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How do I use AirPort Extreme to be able print from my MacBook Pro AND a PC. If I connect printer into AirPort, I can only print on laptop. If printer is connected to PC hard drive, I can only print on desk top. How do I configure this to make both print?

How do I use AirPort Extreme to be able print from my MacBook Pro AND a PC. If I connect printer into AirPort, I can only print on laptop. If printer is connected to PC hard drive, I can only print on desk top. How do I configure this to make both print?

If you have not already done so, your chances will really improve if you....
1) Connect the printer to the USB port on the AirPort Extreme
2) Download and install Bonjour Print Services for Windows on the PC

How to increase Airport Extreme signal strength

I post this in the way of advice, which anyone is free to accept or ignore.
I recently switched to Comcast ("triple play") from an in-complex Ethernet internet system. On my Mac Pro (MP), using speedtest.net, I attained download speeds of at least 22 Mbps. Very fast, I must say. However, I noticed that my Mac Book Pro (MBP) speeds were considerably slower, sometimes only a tenth of those on the MP. I am happy to report that after some reconfiguration I'm attaining almost identical speeds between the MP and MBP. What did I do?
I had initially configured the Airport Extreme (AEx) to operate at 802.11n with 5 Ghz only. Using iStumbler, I discovered that my signal strength was a bit under 60% and the "noise" was 13%. Other wireless devices appearing in the iStumbler window (we live in a downtown apartment complex) showed the "noise" levels at 9%--across the board. I fiddled with the location of my cordless phone (5.4 GHz) and even disconnected it. There was no change in the noise level. I moved the MBP up against the AEx and, while the signal strength increased, upwards of 70%, the noise level remained the same--at 13%.
So, I reconfigured the AEx to 802.11n (b/g compatible). Voila. Not only did the noise drop to 9%, just like the other devices, but the download speeds on the MBP zoomed to around 20 Mbps, or just about the same as the MP.
Too boost the MBP speeds even further I set up an Airport Express (AE) right next to where I use my MBP. I configured it to extend my wireless network.
By the way, I have my MP connected directly to the AEx via Ethernet. The AEx is directly connected to the cable modem. I configured my wireless network as "closed," using interference robustness. I left the multicast rate in default mode, which is 2 Mbps. Transmit power is at 100%.
What I seemed to have learned from this experience is NOT to use the 5 GHz only setting on an AEx, if one wants maximum Internet download speeds. (This seems counterintuitive, I know, because the theoretical limit of 5 GHz is 300 Mbps under 802.11n and "only" 54 Mbps using the 2.5 GHz setting.)

Purchase another Apple AirPort Base Station such as the $99 Express to "wirelessly extend" your AirPort wireless network.

Airport Extreme signal strength problem

My airport extreme's signal is very weak by the time it gets to the other end of my house, and a couple of computers at that end have been using my neighbor's unsecured wifi for their internet connection. How can I extend or strengthen the broadcast? Is there a setting in the airport utility app? The computers affected are windows xp computers. My iMac and Vista pc are connected via the ethernet cable, so they're not using wifi.

Welcome to the discussion area!
Wireless signal strength dissipates quite quickly with distance and any obstructions such as walls or ceilings will make this effect even more noticeable.
If you have a newer dual band AirPort Extreme and you want to extend both bands for greater wireless coverage using wireless only, then you'll need to look at another dual band AirPort Extreme.
The AirPort Express can also be configured to extend your wireless network, but it will only extend one band.
The extending device would normally be located at approximately 1/2 to 2/3 of the distance between your main router and the area that needs more wireless coverage.
Post back if you decide to add an extending device to your network and you need help with configuration details.

4th Generation Airport Extreme signal is too weak?

I have a 4th generation Airport Extreme and have 2 Apple TVs. The Airport Extreme is tied to my office where I do most of my work and would like to keep it here. The problem is that the signal is not reaching the basement TV and it takes at least 15+ minutes at times to load up movies from my iTunes Library (located on my main floor) to stream to our basement theater. Should I just invest in another Airport Extreme to help carry the signal down to the basement? If so, to save money should I just buy another 4th generation or bite the bullet and get a 5th generation?
Thanks!

Also, can I just buy an Airport Express instead of an Extreme if I am just using it as a repeater?

Can I unplug my time machine hard drive from my airport extreme and plug it direcly on my MacBook pro without having to do a new back up?

I want to bring my back up hard drive on a trip, but now it's attahced to my Airport Extreame.
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Leo666 wrote:
I want to bring my back up hard drive on a trip, but now it's attahced to my Airport Extreame.
If I unplug it and plug it directly on my MacBook Pro, it'll keep updating or I'll lose all my back ups and have to restart again?
Yes, but you'll probably have to manually "mount" the sparse bundle containing your backups. See the blue box in Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #17 for details.
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I'm having a problem connecting my airport extreme to my netgear modem, windows 7 pc and my Macbook Pro. Until a few days ago, I had a Westell wireless dsl modem and everything worked fine. Now, the only way I can connect to the internet is through my desktop pc and the hardwired modem.

If your goal is to extend/boost the range of your Netgear router with either or both of the AirPorts, this will not work wirelessly ... at least, not completely by wireless. That is because, WDS is not standard and each manufacturer has had creative license to implement it as they see fit for their products.
Instead, you have at least two other choices to use the Netgear (as the main Internet router) with the AirPorts:
Connect one AirPort directly to the Netgear by Ethernet, and then, configure both AirPorts for an extended wireless network. In this configuration, you would be running two separate wireless networks; one created by the Netgear, and the second the extended network created by the AirPorts.
Connect both AirPorts directly to the Netgear by Ethernet, and then, configure all of the routers for a roaming network. In this configuration, there would be a "single" wireless network where wireless network clients can literally roam from one router to another and still be on the "same" wireless network.

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Welcome to Apple Communities
This port is for printers and external drives only

Can airport extreme be used to back up my macbook pro files?

Am looking for a backup drive for my MacBook Pro and PC and for sharing files, particularly photos.

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Why does my airport extreme not recognize my cable modem anymore?

Have you tried resetting the modem? Power it down and let it rest a moment, then power it back up again.
Also, some ISPs require physically detaching their cable from the modem for it to be fully reset. Literally unscrew it from the modem. Try that, in conjunction with powering it down.
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My Airport Extreme signal is weaker than it used to be. Nothing has changed except I can no longer connect to the internet without running diagnostics each time I try to use it. It will connect and then stay connected until my macbook goes to sleep. When it wakes up, I have to re-connect using diagnostics.
I am using it in the same room I always have and never had problems before. But for the past several weeks, it is just not behaving as it always has. I have checked for a firmware update, but airport utility doesn't indicate that one is available. It's running: Version 6.3.2.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated. It's run great for the past several years. This is a new issue...

Because I can no longer connect to the internet without running diagnostics each time I try to use it. It will connect and then stay connected until my macbook goes to sleep. When it wakes up, I have to re-connect using diagnostics.
I am using it in the same room I always have and never had problems before. It will connect without problems in other rooms that are closer to the base station. But from the room where I ordinarily connect, it won't automatically connect anymore.
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The challenge with the older round AirPort Extremes are that they are "g" wireless devices.
When you configure them for WDS, the speed on the wireless network is cut in half...and probably will not have the bandwidth required to stream video reliably from either AirPort Extreme since both are affected by the WDS setup.
There is not an "automated" setup for WDS. You have to do this manually on both AirPort Extremes. Unfortunately, it is not an easy configuration and it's easy to make a mistake and hard to recover without starting all over again.
Apple's instructions for WDS are here if you want to give it a try.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4262
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HT4667 why can't i get the download to install on my macbook pro for the air port express

why can't i get the download to install on my macbook pro for the air port express ?

If you are running OS X 10.7.2 then you will be able to use AirPort Utility 5.6.
Leopard, Snow Leopard: AirPort Utility 5.5.3.
Tiger: AirPort Utility 5.3.2
Panther: AirPort 4.2

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Reason why I have to reinstall is because I have repaired my Macbook Pro hard drive at a Mac Authorized Repair.
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2. Desided to try a MiniMac and recovered my backup with Time Machine, got the Final Cut Pro working.
3. Got my Macbook Pro back from repair, did backup on this one as well. But this time only the files not the Applications.
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Sounds like there is a file you're not getting. Never do a removal manually. It's so time consuming and a pain. There's a very easy and fast way to do this, safely, properly.
Get the free "Final Cut Remover" app from Digital Rebellion (dot com), use this to remove FCP X.
Reboot the Mac.
Download from scratch.
If you're not seeing FCP X in your app folder, run Disk Utility to Repair all drives.
If that doesn't help, try running Disk Warrior from Altsoft to repair the directories on all drives.

Why is my airport extreme signal strength so weak on my macbook pro?

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