Forwarding Address: OS X

Thursday, August 22, 2002

I have seriously revised my earlier posting about the Linksys WAP11. In short, if you use OS X and/or an AirPort card, you should probably stay away from it. (Yes, I'll edit this posting too if someone says that one or both of those work with the WAP11.)

Basically, it turned out that my old AirPort base station *did* have the "capacitor of death" problem, but it was actually the "capacitors of death" (meaning both capacitors blew). I hadn't looked carefully enough. Fortunately, my good friend Joel Snyder at Opus One had given me two replacement capacitors when he heard I had an AirPort, so I didn't have to go out looking for them when I replaced them. (Although, I have misplaced my soldering iron, so I had to go visit a friend for that!) The instructions on how to replace them were pretty clear. It's not for the faint of heart, but it sure beats paying $300 for a new AirPort.

The WAP11 goes back for a refund, and the AirPort base station is working fine again.