Word: airporters
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...because I invest so much love and hope in Apple, it maddens me when the company falls short of its plug-and-play promise. And too often it does. Take the AirPort and iBook setup I tested. The idea behind it is deliciously simple; the setup was another story...
...AirPort base station, a little UFO-like device that plugs into your phone line, acts as an Internet radio transmitter. Your iBook, iMac or G4 PowerMac loaded with an AirPort card can be online (or hooked together) anywhere in your home, without wires, at 56k connection speeds (AirPort also supports superspeedy cable modems or DSL). Since normal wireless connections creep along at 9,600 bps, this is nothing short of revolutionary...
...when Apple sent me the device, my head was filled with ideas for crazy AirPort experiments. I would download recipes in the kitchen. I would do Christmas shopping from the bathroom. And because the range of this thing is supposed to be more than 150 ft., I would Web-surf wire free while sipping a beer in the Irish pub across the street from my apartment...
Then I tried to set up the system and entered AirPort hell--the Mac equivalent of spending the night on a plastic seat at J.F.K. The AirPort software made both the iBook and my brand-new iMac crash repeatedly. On the rare occasions they recognized the presence of the base station, both machines obstinately refused to connect...
...spotted a lot of confusion between the Remote Access control panel, the TCP/IP control panel and the AirPort extension. Such balkanized Internet responsibility doesn't seem right for a company aiming to build a computer for Everyman...