Filed under: Airport
Xbox incompatible with 802.11n Airport Extreme
TUAW reader Bryan Hughes writes in to tell us that after many unsuccessful attempts, he was unable to connect wirelessly to his Xbox 360 via the new 802.11n Airport Extreme. Over at a discussion at Apple Tech Support, other users report no problem connecting their Wiis and Playstation 3s to the Airport Extreme network but that the Xbox is another matter. The Xbox 360 apparently will not recognize any network with security, whether WEP or WPA and Microsoft's tech support apparently is telling customers that Apple routers are not recommended. So would you be willing to entirely disable security on your wireless network to connect to your Xbox? That's apparently one way of making the connection work. Some readers report that turning off security and closing their network (not advertising the SSID) and using MAC address filtering work. You can join the Xbox/Airport Extreme discussion here.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Joe said 10:43AM on 2-07-2007
Turning off SSID broadcast and turning on MAC address filtering does NOT make the network secure, however. With a sniffer you can pick up both, and it is trivial to spoof a MAC address, not to mention the fact that you don't even have to be on the network to sniff packets and pull out passwords, credit card numbers, etc when the traffic is unencrypted.
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jg3 said 11:11AM on 2-07-2007
A Microsoft product not compatible with security?! Inconceivable!
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Adam Turetzky said 11:12AM on 2-07-2007
I just use an AirportExpress as a bridge and it works fine. The XBOX is connected to the express's ethernet port and the express is setup as a WDS to my main basestation.
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Jonathan said 11:12AM on 2-07-2007
"The Xbox 360 apparently will not recognize any network with security"
This is not true, I've got a Xbox 360 myself, and it does connect to my WEP encrypted network (Linksys access point). Of course, they should support Airport Extreme as well (and I don't see why not, the iPod also works with the 360?)
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ybalx said 12:00PM on 2-07-2007
I have no problem using Connect360
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kevin said 11:24AM on 2-07-2007
I too have security WEP and have used WPA on my Linksys and it works fine and has for a couple of months... I dont think the security is the issue... I dont have an airport extreme to test but I can definitely say it is not security related and thats only because Im angry... this guy is having issues on his setup not the hardware and for that he should be banned from claiming should crazy things... (if he did claim the x360 does not work with his airport extreme...)
HULK SMASH!
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Steve Marshall said 11:25AM on 2-07-2007
The problem is that the Xbox 360 doesn't correctly implement WPA and so cannot 'see' WPA/WPA2 hybrid networks.
If you set the Airport to use plain ol' WPA, though, it should fix the problem.
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Petros Kolyvas said 11:42AM on 2-07-2007
If you're network isn't using any kind of encryption (and I hesitate to call WEP encryption) MAC address filtering and hidding your SSID do not help with matters in any way, and I'm not going to explain why (you know how to use Google). Suffice to say anyone recommending those steps should be (insert funny and deranged punishment here) for their complete lack of effort.
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totoro said 11:49AM on 2-07-2007
http://www.xbox.com/en-US/support/systemsetup/xbox360/accessories/wirelessnetworkadapter-troubleshoot.htm
Xbox360 is compatible with WEP/WPA, but not WPA2, contrary to the manual.
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Tony said 11:51AM on 2-07-2007
If you have a Sonos, you can just plug your Xbox 360 into one of its Ethernet ports and you'll be good to go.
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ars_workerbee said 11:52AM on 2-07-2007
nothing makes a wireless network secure. wep can be broken in a matter of minutes. wpa almost as fast. mac addresses can be spoofed, and monitoring software can pick up networks that aren't broadcasting their SSID.
in short, there is no such thing as wireless security.
sure, having my network MAC-filtered keeps the sorority girls next door from leeching my connection, but nothing will keep someone out if they want on your network.
So the best bet is not to deal with all the hassles that adding "security features" cause, turn off WEP or WPA, and if you want any control at all, just filter it based on mac addresses.
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Kasei said 11:54AM on 2-07-2007
I have two Airport Expresses and one is acting as a bridge. The stero is connected to the bridge and my 360 is connected as well via the wireless adapter. I had a little trouble finding the proper WEP, but I ended up using a 13 character WEP key rather than the longer one. It would not take the longer WEP key.
It works just fine!
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Michael Heilemann said 1:43PM on 2-07-2007
This is hogwash. I have all four of my consoles, including my Wii and PS2 on my Airport Express, and it works perfectly.
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mettmann said 12:11PM on 2-07-2007
Ditto - I call BS - have a WRT54GX v2 with WEP - 360 has no problems connecting."Bryan Hughes" just wanted his name mentioned - if that's really the poster's real name (psudoname alert..)
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Chris said 1:23PM on 2-07-2007
ars_workerbee, I could not disagree with you more. WEP can be cracked almost immediately but as far as I know there is no known crack for wpa-psk. If you think that you can brute force a dictionary attack on a wpa network "almost as fast" as you can crack wep I challenge you to reveal your sources. If the network uses a strong password then you are talking about some serious time to discover the key. I think it is irresponsible for you to recommend that anyone give up on a security as simple to implement as wpa-psk and go for MAC address filtering, which is completely useless (as you mentioned earlier in your response!).
NO network is "secure", but turning wpa is brain dead easy and should make your network almost as secure as a wired network (inasmuch as any network can be secure)
Chris
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Bryan Hughes said 12:51PM on 2-07-2007
@mettmann (if that is your real name)
The blogger misinterpreted what I submitted and should update this post accordingly.
1. This ONLY applies to the new 802.11n Airport Extreme. The previous Airport Extreme, with encryption turned ON, worked just fine.
2. The topic deals with Apple routers, not non-Apple routers. Mentioning a Linksys router doesn't really help readers on an Apple blog.
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jason said 1:05PM on 2-07-2007
@ars_workerbee
That is the most uninformed post ive seen in a long time. Thanks for the laugh.
Please do read a little about wireless security.
Yes Wep is broke However the many forms of wpa/wpa2 are uncrackable at this point if your key is at the max number of hex.
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Midas360 said 3:31PM on 2-07-2007
I want to confirm the issue at hand. For those that believe this is an XBOX 360 issue, I can assure you it's not. I've spent countless hours on the phone with an Apple engineer and he concluded there was a problem. His suggestion.... wait for a firmware update.
This problem is ONLY WITH the NEW Apple Extreme Routers. Linksys, Belkin, Netgear, Buffalo, etc... they all work fine.
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Bryan Hughes said 3:39PM on 2-07-2007
@Michael Heilemann
That may be true, but we're talking about the new, 802.11n Airport Extreme (not Express). I wish I was smoking something on this topic, but I'm not alone (see the Apple forum thread).
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Midas360 said 3:28PM on 2-07-2007
Actually, it's the other way around. The NEW Airport Extreme is incompatible with XBOX 360. Let's not forget that the original Airport Extreme works fine with XBOX 360 along with Belkin, Linksys, Netgear, Buffalo, etc...
I just purchased the NEW Airport Extreme and had this very same problem. I spoke on the phone with an Apple engineer for numerous hours trying to figure out a workaround but to no avail. He told me to wait for a firmware upgrade. Plus, he did mention other known issues with the new extreme.
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