Now with blazing 802.11n, the affordable AirPort Express is powerful enough to run a home Wi-Fi network, yet small enough to take on the road. 
Music Sharing Youve put together an extensive digital music collection in iTunes and arranged it into playlists to suit your every mood. Now you want to enjoy it in your living room on your home stereo, not just in the den, where your computer sits. You can, thanks to AirPort Express with AirTunes. Plug. Play. Rock out. AirTunes takes the music from the iTunes library on your computer and sends it wirelessly to any stereo or speakers in your home. All you have to do is plug an AirPort Express into an electrical outlet near those speakers, then connect them with an audio cable. In iTunes, you can choose which speakers you want your music to play on — in your den, living room, or bedroom. If you have more than one AirPort Express connected to speakers, you can play the same music on all your speakers at the same time to create a whole-house musical experience. Party Central. If you already have a wireless network in place, you can use AirPort Express to add music to its capabilities. Lets say, for example, you have AirPort Extreme set up in your den. Theres no need to scrap this setup and create a whole new network. Simply connect AirPort Express to your stereo in your favorite music room and plug it into an electrical outlet — it wirelessly links to your existing network, letting you play your music in your room of choice without moving anything or connecting anything else. 
Wireless Printing Ever wish you had more than one printer in your home — one for every computer so you never have to go far to print? Say you want to print a Google Map from the living room, or your son wants to print his school report from his bedroom. Taking each computer into the den simply to print something is inconvenient, and buying a printer for every room is expensive. A printer in every room. Virtually. With wireless printing through AirPort Express, its almost like having a printer in every room of the house. AirPort Express uses the Mac- and PC-compatible Bonjour networking technology to let everyone in the house take advantage of one centrally available printer. Wirelessly, of course. Good to print. Heres how simple it is to set up: Just plug the printer into the USB port on the AirPort Express Base Station, add it to the printer list on your Mac or PC, and youre good to print — without a single cable tethering anyones computer to the printer. If all you want to do is access your USB printer wirelessly, you dont even need a broadband Internet connection. You can just set up your AirPort Express for wireless printing and thats it. 
Internet Sharing With AirPort Express connected to your DSL or cable modem, up to 10 users at a time can surf the web, send email, annihilate the competition in multiplayer games, and much more — wire-free. More than the web. AirPort Express connects people to each other as well. You can wirelessly share photos, movies, and other files without having to worry about slow data transmissions. Nor do you have to concern yourself with a difficult network setup. AirPort Express uses the Bonjour technology in Mac OS X to allow your AirPort-equipped Mac computers running Mac OS X to find each other with no effort on your part — they discover each other just by virtue of being in range of the network. Extended range. If you already have a wireless network in your home and would like to extend its range, AirPort Express is the answer. For example, suppose you want to extend the range of your current AirPort-based network to your backyard, garage, or attic. You can use AirPort Express as a wireless bridge to extend the range of your primary base station. Theres no need for extra wires or cables. Just place AirPort Express in range of your primary base station (either an AirPort Extreme Base Station or another AirPort Express Base Station) and near the area where you want your wireless connection. With its easy portability, you can even move AirPort Express from place to place. So if you want to connect wirelessly from your basement one day and your garage the next, just plug it in within range of the primary base station and in a spot near those areas. Wireless to go. Compact and portable, AirPort Express is also a great way to share Internet access when you go on the road. Say your hotel suite offers only a wired network connection. Just plug it into your AirPort Express and set up the wireless network with the simple AirPort Utility. 
802.11n The AirPort Express Base Station now features 802.11n, the next-generation high-speed wireless technology included with most shipping Mac computers and some newer PCs with compatible cards. Blazing performance. Based on an IEEE 802.11n draft specification, AirPort Express features two antennas and uses a technology called multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) to transmit multiple data streams simultaneously. The result? AirPort Express delivers data transfer speeds up to five times those of previous-generation 802.11g wireless networks — while achieving up to twice the range. And with its support for both the 2.4GHz and 5GHz wireless frequencies, AirPort Express reduces the possibility of interference from appliances and cordless phones that use the 2.4GHz frequency. Imagine the possibilities. Up to 10 people can all share the same Internet connection, exchange files with the file-sharing capability built into Mac OS X or Windows, access local and remote file servers, annihilate the competition in multiplayer games — anything a typical network user can do, plus a number of things that are decidedly not typical, such as wireless music streaming and printing. Compatible with 802.11a/b/g. Most currently shipping Mac systems support the next-generation 802.11n technology in the AirPort Express Base Station.4 And AirPort Express is compatible with Mac computers, PCs, and wireless devices such as iPhone and iPod touch that use 802.11a, b, or g technologies. 
Compatibility Part Wi-Fi access point. Part wireless router. AirPort Express just works, seamlessly and wirelessly, with all your Wi-Fi devices. In fact, its the easiest way for everyone in your family to share a single broadband Internet connection and USB printer without messy cables. More than computers. Computers are only part of the wireless story. When your iPhone or iPod touch are in range, theyll connect to your AirPort Express network to let you surf the web and more. In fact, iPhone will automatically switch from the EDGE network to your Wi-Fi network as soon as you walk in the front door of your home. And if you use Apple TV, you can use AirPort Express to stream your iTunes library to your widescreen TV. Whatever kind of Wi-Fi device you have, itll work with your AirPort Express. Mac- and PC-friendly. AirPort Express works effortlessly with any computer that uses Wi-Fi standards, whether its a Mac or a Dell, HP, IBM, or any other Windows-based PC. Thats because the AirPort Express is compatible with computers using the 802.11a, 802.11b, and 802.11g specifications, and it also works with computers that are 802.11n draft 2.0 compliant. 
Security The AirPort Express Base Station takes strong measures to keep your online world as safe as possible — from securing your base station to preventing outside intruders. Worry-free networking. It starts with the industry-standard encryption technologies built into AirPort Express, including WPA/WPA2 and 128-bit WEP.1 When you turn on encryption — easy to do using AirPort Utility — youll ensure that only people with the correct password can join your wireless network. Barring the network door. AirPort Express includes a built-in firewall that creates a barrier between your network and the Internet, protecting your data from malicious Internet attacks. When you set up the base station, the firewall is automatically turned on to keep the bad guys out. For computers with a cable or DSL modem, using AirPort is actually safer than being directly connected to the modem. 
Airport Utility If you think setting up a wireless network is difficult, think again. AirPort Utility for Mac and Windows guides you through the process, and youll have your network up and running in minutes. Quick and easy setup. Other wireless routers make you do all the work — from deciphering obscure instructions to figuring out where to enter your passwords. AirPort Utility does most of the work for you by stepping you through the setup process quickly and easily. In most cases, your wireless network can be up and running in less time than it takes to make a cup of coffee. Plug in, set up, enjoy. For the most basic setup, all you have to do is plug your AirPort Express into an electrical outlet and connect your DSL or cable modem. Then open the AirPort Utility software and just follow the onscreen instructions. The software takes you through step by step, asking for relevant information, setting up encryption and security, and configuring your computer to access your new network — all in plain English. Whether you use a Mac or a PC, the whole network can be ready to go in about five minutes. And if you want to do more — such as stream your music wirelessly or add a shared USB printer — its just as easy. |