Will an Apple AirPort Extreme handle 500/950 fibre?

Forums › LAN (ethernet/Wifi/routers/Bluetooth) › Will an Apple AirPort Extreme handle 500/950 fibre?

ShaggyMop

16 posts

Geek

#289290 26-Aug-2021 11:10

Hi all, looking at upgrading from our current bigpipe 100/20 fibre ($79/month) to a faster connection, likely Now ultra unlimited 950/500 ($99/month, but are doing a deal for half price for first 6 months).

At the moment we have an Apple AirPort Extreme plugged into our ONT handling the routing and wifi for one end of the house, with an Ethernet cable running from this to a second AirPort Extreme in bridge mode at the other end of the house to extend the wifi - this one also has an NVR for our 2 external cameras and our smart TV connected to the Ethernet ports.

Wondering if the airports will handle the higher speed, or at least temporarily allow more than 100/20 through, or whether it is time to bite the bullet and upgrade to a proper router and some good wifi access points?
It looks like Now is similar to bigpipe and doesn’t require vlan tagging which I know the airports don’t support so that should be ok (whatever that is). Just don’t know how to work out if they would throttle the speed we’re paying for…

The plan was always to move to a unifi mesh type setup at some stage with a router that has more ports for direct cat 6 connections for the Xbox, pc etc. - just not quite yet if we can put it off a bit longer. We have good access below the house and in the roof so we can run Ethernet everywhere for access points etc. Cameras are both set up on POE cables running to the NVR I ran through the roof and terminated with rj45 plugs for example.

Any advice appreciated

wratterus

1687 posts

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#2766912 26-Aug-2021 11:14

Time to upgrade I'd say. Airport extreme would be like 8 years old now wouldn't it? From memory you might see 400mbps thought it.

Edit - I think that was PPPoE - if you are DHCP/IPoE you may see better than that. Perhaps someone who has used once recently might be able to chime in.

nztim

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#2766915 26-Aug-2021 11:24

Apple AirPort has had its day, even the Extreme is only 802.11n - Time for a new Router

Any views expressed on these forums are my own and don't necessarily reflect those of my employer.

Yabanize

2350 posts

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#2766946 26-Aug-2021 11:47

nztim:

Apple AirPort has had its day, even the Extreme is only 802.11n - Time for a new Router

If this was the most recent Airport Extreme (tall one), it has 802.11 AC

But yes, Google suggests it will peak out around 400 as a router (using the WAN/LAN ports)

Mehrts

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#2766948 26-Aug-2021 11:51

What's the exact model/version, as various AirPort Extreme base stations covered a 10 year span.

If it's the newest 802.11ac model (A1521), then it'll most likely be fine for home use, however that's still getting very long in the tooth with regard to wifi &routing technology.

Since you've already got this setup, why not leave it as is & then upgrade if it's a bottleneck for you?

Senecio

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#2766952 26-Aug-2021 11:56

I really wish Apple would get back into the router market. The Airport Extremes and Time Stations were awesome consumer routers back in the day, the latter with network attached storage. I still have a time machine down in the garage purely connected for back up purposes.

ShaggyMop

16 posts

Geek

#2767043 26-Aug-2021 15:09

They’re the tall ones, A1521. 400 wouldn’t be the end of the world for a while if that’s where they top out, I just wanted to check how much it would throttle and therefore how soon we’d need to upgrade I guess, I’m not familiar with a lot of the terminology.
Currently connected via PPPoE, as per bigpipes instructions (not that I know the difference).

Would it be an advantage to go with skinny or stay bigpipe instead of changing to Now and getting a free router to use at the ONT as part of the deal? Could presumably use the airports to handle the wifi duties instead of doing all the routing perhaps?

PJ48

295 posts

Ultimate Geek

#2767122 26-Aug-2021 17:16

I can't vouch for the Airport Extreme's routing ability, but certainly I don't think the wifi will throttle you at all. We are on Spark using Smart modem, and I have a tall Airport Time Capsule in the circuit just doing TimeCapsule duty. Out of interest I turned the wifi back on and compared the wifi performance at 2 m distance between Spark Smart Modem and Airport.

This is Smart Modem

This is Airport

So actually the old device can actually outperform the Smart Modem in wifi speed!

Equinox IT

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Behodar

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#2767153 26-Aug-2021 18:26

I have the older 802.11n AirPort and it caps out at ~300 Mb/s over Ethernet, when handling routing/PPPoE. I've been meaning to replace it but I don't know what's good any more!

RunningMan

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#2767159 26-Aug-2021 18:52

nztim:

[snip]even the Extreme is only 802.11n

This is not correct. The last one was 802.11ac, and the last 3 models 3x3:3 MIMO, so actually very high spec at the time. 3x3:3 ac can still hold its own pretty well now as @PJ48 has demonstrated. The big issue in NZ with using the Airport series was no VLAN tagging so not user friendly on most UFB connections. Sure, there's been improvements with ac wave 2 and ax, but wouldn't relegate a late model extreme to the scrap heap just for the sake of it yet. Only concern would be if there are any outstanding security issues - don't think there has been a firmware update since about 2019.

ShaggyMop

16 posts

Geek

#2767303 27-Aug-2021 07:26

Leaning towards a switch to 2 degrees now and see they need vlan tagging, will probably use their router for now with the wifi off and set the airports up as wifi extenders only.
Time to start looking at setting up a little network cabinet to house the nvr, a new router and run cat 6 feeds back to for new wifi access points etc. I think. Ubiquiti seem to be well regarded?

stocksp

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#2767305 27-Aug-2021 07:34

Shamelessly jumping in to plug a sale :) I have a ubiquity nano HD AP point for sale in near new condition.

The nanoHD was bought from PBtech 29/5/21. Still has the receipt. It was never mounted so all mounting hardware etc unsealed and 'as new'. POE Injector included. Was bought for $313. GZ price $250

https://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=77&topicid=288942

Yabanize

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#2767522 27-Aug-2021 12:30

Voyager is an ISP that has optional VLAN tagging I think.

michaelmurfy

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#2767553 27-Aug-2021 13:37

I’m just going to say - if you’re switching to 2degrees then use their router. The AirPort Extreme is end of life now and performance is pretty average where the Fritz!Box has full WAN hardware acceleration and pretty good WiFi.

Then you can purchase a cheap mesh node from them too in order to seamlessly extend your WiFi.

Michael Murphy | https://murfy.nz
Referral Links: Quic Broadband (use R122101E7CV7Q for free setup)

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