Apple Airport Extreme Base Station with FiOS Router

[#1]

Verizon tech informs I will not need an Airport Extreme Base Station with my FiOS Actiontec M1424WR 802.11 b/g wireless router.  My FiOS speed is 35/35.   Unfortunately, my old printer does not have Ethernet connectivity, so I will have to purchase a new printer.  This should work fine.

Apple informs that I can network my old printer using the Airport Extreme Base Station 802.11n  and that this station will be FASTER than FiOS and offer more benefits.  In reading many online forums, it seems that Airport Extreme Base Station does not easily work with this FiOS router.

Any advice for this novice?

[Hubrisnxs]

Can I use my wireless or an extra router along with the Verizon provided router?

[BorisR]

You can connect WAN port of your (extra) router to any free port of Verizon device and create another wireless network. Just take into consideration two points:

1. You will have to manually choose broadcast channel for each router in order to minimize interference between them
2. Make sure that your router does not use the same IP as router from Verizon (192.168.1.1)

Good luck!

[Anti-Phish1]

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@BorisR wrote:

Make sure that your router does not use the same IP as router from Verizon (192.168.1.1)

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More specifically, if you use the Actiontec LAN to Airport WAN method, the LAN side of the Airport must have a different subnet address (e.g. 192.168.2.x). 

[RMN3]

Yep you can just use both so you don't need to buy another printer and because the Airport Extreme is N whereas the Actiontec is only G. Just connect the Airport the the Actiontec using the WAN port. Then use the Airport Utility to put it in Bridge Mode so that it does not try to distribute ip adresses.

[jhn56]

I'm curious why it's not OK to have the AEBS handing out IP addresses on the network it creates.  Assume I'm not interested in hooking anything up to the VZ router except the cable TV box.  Thanks so much.

[Anti-Phish1]

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@jhn56 wrote:

I'm curious why it's not OK to have the AEBS handing out IP addresses on the network it creates. 

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There are basic two methods of connecting another router behind the Actiontec.

• Actiontec LAN port to AEBS (for example) WAN port.   If your do this the AEBS must have a different subnet from the Actiontec (e.g. 192.168.2.x).  In this case, the AEBS will hand out DHCP addresses on its subnet.  THe disabvantage of this approach is that every thing behind the AEBS will be double natted.
• Actiontec LAN port to AEBS LAN port.  In this case, the WAN side of the AEBS is not used and DHCP server must be disabled on the AEBS because the LAN side of both routers are on the same subnet.  If DHCP is not disabled, a client will randomly get a DHCP address from one or the other.  If it gets its DHCP information from the AEBS, the AEBS will think it is the WAN gateway, when in fact it is not.

[lasagna]

Minor correction Anti-Phish -- when you configure an Airport Base Station or TimeCapsule into "Bridge" mode, the WAN port functions in the same manner as the LAN ports.  So it is safe to use it just like all the other ports on the Airport.  I tell people to always connect the WAN port of the Airport to the LAN port of the router because then if you ever want to exit bridge mode and use the Airport to create a second private network, you need only change the mode and assign an IP address on a different subnet.

[whazzup2]

I hope you all are still there --

My tale of woe is that I've been having random diconnects from FIOS with the Actiontec router since I got a new AEBS in March. I've worked with Verizon and Apple and they both tell me about a conflict, but neither supports the other. So I found this thread.

My AEBS is attached from Actiontec LAN to AEBS WAN

If I understand correctly, then I should be ok now that my AEBS IP address is 198.168.1.9 -- as long as the AEBS is different I am ok. Then I saw this that the next to last digit needs to be different. How critical do I need a 192.168.2.x vs 192.168.1.x where the last digit is not 1? And how do I do that? There is something called "Connect using: DHCP" which doesn't allow me to change the address. However, I can coose "Static" in the dropdown and choose the address. I would prefer not to do that if I can avoid it.

I would really appreciate some guidance. Thank you.

[viafax999]

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@whazzup wrote:

I hope you all are still there --

My tale of woe is that I've been having random diconnects from FIOS with the Actiontec router since I got a new AEBS in March. I've worked with Verizon and Apple and they both tell me about a conflict, but neither supports the other. So I found this thread.

My AEBS is attached from Actiontec LAN to AEBS WAN

If I understand correctly, then I should be ok now that my AEBS IP address is 198.168.1.9 -- as long as the AEBS is different I am ok. Then I saw this that the next to last digit needs to be different. How critical do I need a 192.168.2.x vs 192.168.1.x where the last digit is not 1? And how do I do that? There is something called "Connect using: DHCP" which doesn't allow me to change the address. However, I can coose "Static" in the dropdown and choose the address. I would prefer not to do that if I can avoid it.

I would really appreciate some guidance. Thank you.

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very critical
the subnet that airport express is using for it's wireless connections must be a different subnet (192.168.2) to the verizon router subnet (192.168.1).  However the Airport express WAN port is on the verizon subnet so must have an address 192.168.1.x where x is any other number than 1 so 192.168.1.9 is fine.  And yes you could say connect by dhcp which saves you the annoyance of picking a static address and mucking about with the defauly gateway and dns server addresses to as the dhcp assigment will provide all those too.