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Apple's New, Improved Airport

Posted by timothy on from the a-bump-in-specs-beats-a-bump-on-the-head dept.

timbck2 writes: "Apple has just released a new and greatly improved version of their Airport 802.11b wireless network access point, with better WEP encryption (128-bit now instead of 40-bit), better non-Mac PC integration, and a new LAN connection port. Here are the tech specs." An anonymous reader pointed to Apple's rather bland press release as well. This is a good upgrade to the Airport, with thanks probably due in part to companies like Linksys who are making much less expensive 802.11 base stations (which work great with Airport cards, too), though lacking a modem.

6 of 259 comments (clear)

  1. More security improvements by musicmaster · · Score: 5, Informative

    They have done more than add 128 bits WEP. 128 bits WEP is still easy to crack.

    But Apple has added Radius and a firewall too. See their FAQ at http://www.apple.com/airport/faq/.

  2. WEP Security by rlp · · Score: 5, Informative

    A group of AT&T researchers broke WEP security (even the 128 bit version). See paper here. They recommend treating 802.11 connections as open and using things like SSL and SSH to protect sensitive data.

    --
    [Insert pithy quote here]
    1. Re:WEP Security by BJH · · Score: 4, Informative

      Since it requires somewhere in the region of a gigabyte of data to go over the wireless network before it's possible to crack 128-bit WEP, I suggest you change the key update interval to something a little more realistic.

      Since 801.11b runs at a maximum of 11Mbps (theoretically, anyway - it's more like 3-5Mbps), it's easy to work out that an attacker would require a minimum of:

      (1000 * 8) / 11 / 60 = 12.1 minutes

      in order to compromise a fully-saturated WEP connection. (In actual fact, it'd take a lot longer than that for most networks.)

      So, set the key to update every ten minutes, and you're pretty much guaranteed to be safe.

  3. Re:AOL support by mactari · · Score: 4, Informative

    No probably. Read the FAQ, natch. :^)
    http://www.apple.com/airport/faq/

    Q: Why didn't AOL work with AirPort before?
    A: AOL has a unique login protocol, which kept AirPort from being able to establish an AOL connection. Working together, Apple and AOL have devised a method to allow AOL customers to use AirPort. In fact, AirPort is currently the only wireless solution that works with AOL.

    --

    It's all 0s and 1s. Or it's not.
  4. Re:Still needs something... by jaoswald · · Score: 4, Informative

    I am surprised that they did not apply the 802.11a standard that some other base station makers have recently announced for increased bandwidth over the wireless portion of the LAN. Oh well, I'll just have to wait...

    802.11a isn't something you just "apply." It is a different range of spectrum entirely (5 GHz, not 2.5 GHz), requiring a totally new RF design.

  5. AirPort & AOL by green+pizza · · Score: 4, Informative

    It seems a lot of folks are misunderstanding the new AOL support. You see, the AirPort also has an internal modem for those without broadband. Previously, the modem could only be used to dial into a PPP account. With version 2.0 of the AirPort software, it can dial into an AOL account for Internet access (i.e., it now has a version of AOL's proprietary software in its firmware). This is not a feature that most geeks will notice, as we'll be using the AirPort's ethernet interface with our broadband connections and *maybe* the modem for PPP backup. But for those that get their Internet access via an AOL dialup, and would like to share it with their 802.11 equiped machines via NAT/DHCP, this is godsend.