AirPort Express reborn as dual-band base station

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Apple has revamped its AirPort Express with a new case design and new features that mimic what can be found on its larger cousins, the AirPort Extreme Base Station and Time Capsule. The device is still $99.

The new AirPort Express looks radically different from the previous generation, which seemed to sport a case design stolen from one of Apple’s laptop AC adapters. Now it looks like a proper Apple networking peripheral: the squared device with rounded corners looks like a wee AirPort Extreme Base Station, with a proper backplane that includes WAN and LAN Ethernet connections, a USB port to connect a printer, power jack and audio output port – so it can still serve as a simple wireless audio connection to use to stream audio from your Mac or iOS device to a nearby stereo.

But under the hood is where the biggest enhancement lays – the AirPort Express now sports dual-band 802.11n wireless networking, which means that 5 GHz devices can connect at higher speeds.



  • http://twitter.com/hypothesard Hypothesard

    At home I have an Airport Extreme, in my Travel Bag I have an Airport Express.

    I get that this new Express Finally can operate like my Extreme, but Not being able to stick It into the wall and now having to deal with a cord and having to find a place to put It (picture yourself in some less than electrical safe place), Removes some convenience the Old Express had for travelers…

    This is more of an Pocketable Extreme than an Express (adding a Gigabit Switch make the tricks and It has an audio AirPlay out as a bonus)

    • krispayne

      Easy enough: develop a plug that eliminates the cord. :-)

      • http://twitter.com/hypothesard Hypothesard

        Not a Bad idea for a KickStarter Project, but the Plug should be dirty Cheap (10 USD max) But because of the Position of the Power Plug this Hypothetical adapter couldn’t be straight [It would block the ports against the wall] The Piece would need be somehow convoluted and have some clamps to secure Itself to the Brick…

        And then There would be the problem of making 10 variants as there is no real universal [wall] PowerPlug.

        Nice idea

        Thanks for picking my brain

    • http://twitter.com/colinmat Colin Mattson

      I had the same initial reaction until I tried to remember the last time my AirPort Express had actually left my travel bag.

      Obviously we’ve all got different needs, but at least where I’ve been going the connectivity situation’s much better than it was several years ago. WiFi’s almost a given nowadays, you can use multiple computers simultaneously, and the last couple (newer) properties I stayed at didn’t even have an Ethernet jack I could have plugged the Express into.

      The “Old Express” was one of those brilliant Apple innovations for its time and I’m certainly not giving mine up, but at the same time I can see why they were comfortable abandoning the travel-friendly form factor.

      • http://twitter.com/hypothesard Hypothesard

        You’re right, times have changed, at least for the parts of the world we’re living in :P

        Cheers

  • http://twitter.com/mikejohansson Mikael Johansson

    It looks more like a white Apple TV 2nd Gen.