strange problem with airport extreme

this is juggernaut... esp. for me because i am not a computer programmer.

i have an older macbook pro that is running os x 10.4.11 that used to work just fine with an airport extreme (model a1143). i had a really basic wi-fi set up with time warner / earthlink cable internet.

life was dandy, until i moved...

now, airport utility can't find the base station at all... and i still have twc / earthlink in the new place.

i've experimented with the configurations for ages now... and nothing seems to work. the basic problem is that airport utility can't actually find the device. this leads me to believe that the airport extreme base station is just not picking up on the wireless network signal coming from the cable modem, and also can't find the macbook.

here's what i've done:

1) plugging directly from the cable modem into the laptop via ethernet works, no problem.

2) i have an old airport express (not extreme), which i plugged the cable modem into. airport utility sees the airport express device, and then it finds my wireless network signal as set up on my computer.

3) i put that away and then plugged the airport extreme back into the cable modem. still, airport utility couldn't find the airport extreme or the wireless signal through after multiple attempts. so, i removed the ethernet cord from the cable modem and plugged it in directly to the laptop. then airport utility found the airport extreme. i reformatted it... but then the device couldn't restart. i did this three times... each time the same.

4) i removed the ethernet cord from my computer. i put it back to be between the cable modem and the airport extreme... hoping the reset would work. but i still have the same problem.

in the end, the airport utility can't find the airport extreme. what's more, my wireless network does not appear as an option in my laptop's network settings when i have the cable modem connected to the airport extreme. but i know that the cable internet service is working!

i have no idea what's going on. has anyone else had this issue before? ideas on what to do?

cheers.
k

Welcome to the forum. It may be that now that you have done a number of attempts at getting it started that it is time to start from the beginning.
Go into Sys Preferences > Network and select Airport in Show box. Remove all the networks in there.
Click on Network and hit minus - similar to pic below


Click for full size

Next do a factory reset on the Extreme and then plug ethernet cable into WAN port < circle of dots > and the other end into ethernet port of MBP.
When you power it on wait for it to pop up in Airport Utility - it can take a while.
Then set up a new network and set it to bridge mode. Pic below is similar to what u need;


Click for full size

Then connect it up as normal and the Network should show in the menubar as being available.
Have done this from memory as it is a while since i used Tiger and the older Extremes, so someone may need to add a step if i have missed something.

thanks so much for the help!

getting it into bridge mode is what did the trick. it turned out that working through my airport extreme took more tweaking because "bridge mode" originally wasn't an option... but once i clamored through the ether world there, bridge mode did the trick!

i'm very grateful for your help! and so is my mac.

cheers!
kyle