How do I turn my iMac into an AP basestation?

I currently own a G5 imac that I bought for myself last year. Now, I need a laptop, and I was going to sell my iMac and buy a PowerBook, but a relative was VERY generous and just bought me a PowerBook for my graduation. Now I have an iMac and a PowerBook!

However, my dorm next year doesn't have wireless internet inside (but the rest of the campus is wireless), so I want to find a way that I can turn my iMac (which will sit on the desk) into an AirPort Basestation -- basically networking the two macs so that whenever I'm in my dorm I can have wireless internet, printing, filesharing, etc. on my PowerBook (which will be 100% wireless, I hope).

Anyone know how to do this?

As long as your iMac has an airport card you can do this. As per help:

1 Open System Preferences, click Sharing, and then click Internet.
2 Choose a network port from the "Share your connection from" pop-up menu.
3 Select "Built-in Ethernet" or AirPort depending on which computers will share your Internet connection.

Click to expand...

err. if you have wired internet, why not just connect that to a wireless router and create your own access point?

bc you can't do that in a dorm...they don't let you have any type of router what so ever. they are very strict on what you use their network for. and what u use on their network.

rmhop81 said:

bc you can't do that in a dorm...they don't let you have any type of router what so ever. they are very strict on what you use their network for. and what u use on their network.

Click to expand...

Tis the same on my campus, but our network is so PC centric that i can set up a mac as describe above and I can use (most of) the network wirelessly through an old powermac with airport.

good luck

rmhop81 said:

bc you can't do that in a dorm...they don't let you have any type of router what so ever. they are very strict on what you use their network for. and what u use on their network.

Click to expand...

By using your mac's wireless network connection, you're creating a router. There is no difference whatsoever in using a "hardware" router and a "software" router. Your mac will be the interface point and assign an IP address to your laptop just like a router. If your college's rules are so narrow as to restrict "routers" but not what you're describing, perhaps they should hire someone who understands networks and computers in general to make their computer policy.