Mike Mertsock

I just finished setting up the wireless router that Val gave me for a birthday. I just finished setting it up completely Microsoft-free, that is. Pulling this off smoothly using a Mac AirPort with a non-Airport base station does, however, require some thinking ahead. Here are some tips, especially for on-campus setups.

My setup

Router: Linksys WRT54G Broadband Router (10/100 ethernet, 802.11 b/g)
Computer: PowerBook with AirPort Extreme
ISP: RIT campus LAN

Linksys routers do not advertise much in the way of Mac support, but if you don’t mind going without the handholding of the “setup wizard” on the CD, everything will be fine. Linksys has always treated me very well, and their routers’ web-based config applications have always worked well. But don’t throw out the setup CD because the entire 100 page manual is available in its Doc directory as a PDF.

Preparation

• Router registration: being on campus, I had to register my router before it could even get an IP address. Most students will have to do this. I conveniently found the MAC address of the router on the packaging, with the serial number.
• Materials: remember to download any web pages or programs you might need before beginning the installation. Here are the two online resources I used/downloaded:
  • ATPM: How To: Wireless Network Encryption (http://www.atpm.com/8.04/wifi.shtml)
  • WEP Key Maker (software, http://homepage.mac.com/chally/toolsandutils.html)
• Online manual: the setup CD has a manual in the Doc directory that I used as my guide instead of the Windows-only setup wizard

Implementation

I was able to follow the online manual provided by Linksys for most of the installation. I assume that setting up most other non-Apple routers from a Mac computer is a similar process. I will not go into much detail when the steps are thoroughly covered by the manual. The web interface below refers, of course, to the Linksys interface.

1. Set up the hardware. Chapter 4 of the Linksys manual describes this process clearly and accurately. Basically: find a good location, hook up ethernet cables (including from your Mac to the router, for initial setup), and plug it in.
2. Initial configuration. Since we’re not using the setup wizard, skip straight to Chapter 6 to configure the router manually.
   1. Log in to the admin web server on the router and immediately change the admin password by clicking the Administration tab.
   2. Configure basic router settings. Being at RIT’s on-campus network, Automatic DHCP configuration is the right choice; this will often be the right choice for cable modem and some other broadband users.
   3. Check status. Click the Status tab to see how well things are running. You should see a MAC address that matches the address printed on the router and/or packaging, an IP address, subnet mask, gateway, and at least one non-zero DNS. If not, there are many possible causes for the problem that I won’t discuss, since so far we have only done wired configuration that is basically identical to traditional broadband routers.
   4. Registered equipment. If you needed to register a router with the network administrators (for example, if you are on a college campus), you may now be able to compare the router status to the registration information. At RIT, my registration expects a specific MAC address and assigned me a specific IP address. I noticed that the IP address didn’t match, and was quite sure that I did not need to set up a static IP address on the router. Unplugging the router at this point and then plugging it back in after a minute completely solved the problem.
   5. Finish any extra settings needed under the Setup section before continuing with wireless setup.
3. Wireless configuration.
   1. Go to the Wireless tab and set up the basic settings. Be very ashamed of yourself if you do not change the SSID. It is a good idea to turn off SSID broadcast, and it should not cause much of a hassle with a Mac.
   2. According to the ATPM article, Wireless Network Encryption, WEP encryption is the proper form to use with your Mac. I recommend following the procedure in this article to set up WEP and create a key.
   3. Hopefully, you will enable some other security measures too. I am using the wireless MAC filter. Under the Wireless > Wireless MAC Filter tab, Enable the filter, choose to Permit only PCs listed, and click the button to add MAC address of the particular computers (such as your own) to grant access to the wireless network. You can find the MAC address of your AirPort card by opening System Preferences/Network/AirPort checking the AirPort ID. Note that this MAC address is different than the one used by your ethernet card. Remember to click Save on both the MAC filter popup window and the main MAC filter form.
   4. I also recommend disabling access from the wireless netowrk to the router config web application. In other words, require that you access the config site through a wired connection to the router. This is done in the Administration tab: disable Wireless Access Web.
4. Now you should be able to disconnect the ethernet cable from your Mac to the router, connect to the router via that Mac’s airport connection, and happily blog about it. Of course, computers on other platforms should now have access to the network, too.

Final thoughts

Take your time and read the manuals. It really is easy if you think ahead and don’t start blindly tweaking settings. The ATPM article was very helpful for me, but note that some of the screen shots are outdated (compared to OS X 10.4.5).

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 12th, 2006 at 2:13 am and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.