New Apple AirPort Express (2nd Generation) - 2012 - Unboxing & Review

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhey guys this is Mike the Detroit BG with a look at the second generation Apple AirPort Express base station this is the first time this product has received an allnew upgrade since 2004 when it debuted so it's been a long time now if you're familiar with the old model basically was this thing that looked like Apple's wall wart or power adapter for a MacBook Pro so you had folding out a power prong so you can connect this directly to a wall adapter or you can add an extension cable uh to it so you can extend the range but basically this was a networking solution basically a compact version of the airport express it was designed to be portable so you could take this to a hotel room for example connect it to the wired internet and have a wireless access network for your laptop we also have a USB connector here for connecting a printer and a audio output for connecting uh devices such as your AV receiver for broadcasting AirPlay audio from your iOS device or your Mac now the airport express retains a lot of those features and adds a few more so this now has dual band support so it supports both 2.4 and 5 GHz networks of course supports Wireless and networking speeds on the back you can see we have a diagram of exactly what's on the back of the device we'll take a look at that once we get it out of the box all right so let's go ahead and crack open the plastic and take a look all right so all we have to do is slide out the airport express and there it is basically looks like a white version of the Apple TV we have a little tab here to lift it up so you can see it's wrapped in plastic and we're going to take a look at that in just a minute designed by Apple and California with a nice little tab here to pull up this cardboard and here is that very neatly wound up cable again just like the packaging of the Apple TV white instead of black and uh below that is the airport express setup guide so we have the airport express setup guide with step-by-step instructions although it's pretty easy to do so so you can see the what each Port means your accessories that sort of thing we have the airport express regulatory certificate and limited warranty no Apple stickers because this is an accessory so generally they don't come with them now let's go ahead and peel off this plastic and slide it out so we have another piece of plastic again just like the Apple TV wrapping the edge of it so we just need to peel this back you see it's very shiny white plastic covering the back of the ports and there we go now taking a look around you can see we have our shiny Apple logo surrounded by the sort of matte etched finish along the side we have that glossy white finish on the front we have an LED indicator which tells us our Network status along the back we have our power connector our W port for connecting our ISP we have a l port for connecting other network devices a USB port for connecting a printer for wireless printing we also have our audio jack which supports both to link Optical or analog we also have our little reset button here for resetting the device back to our factory defaults on the bottom we have our pedestal which again just like the Apple TV sort of raise it circular keeps it off the surface of the table with our Apple logo and it kind of has a textured finish to it so it helps to uh keep it secure on a desktop now just to compare the previous and current generation model you can see the airport express has changed substantially in its form factor these used to be sort of a traveling wireless access point so you can connect this to a wall adapter you don't need any sort of wire or cable to carry with you now this of course needs an separate cable which you'll need to carry with you so this is really I don't think designed to be portable it's not as necessary as it used to be uh but if you look at the ports there are a few differences here as well so we have only one land port here but now we have a w and landan Port here so you can either have both an ISP and a separate device connected to it this used to be one or the other now we we have two we still have one USB port both for wireless printing so you can connect a USB printer so every device in your house can have access to it Windows PC iOS device we also have our analog SL optical audio output so again these are combination ports you have to buy separate adapter if you want to use the optical function but again these are for AirPlay so you can connect your AV receiver and have full digital audio from your iTunes account on your Mac or PC or from your iOS device for AirPlay audio so it works quite well and then we still have our reset button to reset everything back to factory default now as I said this basically looks like a white version of the Apple TV so the design and construction are almost identical so again we have the shiny logos on top with that matte finish around it on the side we have that glossy finish so black and white same thickness on the bottom we have that pedestal design so that circular pedestal design with the Apple logo and we even have an LED indicator which is sort of hidden on the Apple TV uh and on the white one you'll see it of course they're very different devices so they have very different ports but otherwise very similar in design our next step here is to connect it and set it up now with the airport express connected we can see our LED indicator so when it's a solid Amber it's telling us that it's booting up when it's blinking Amber it's telling us it needs to be set up or it's not working properly solid green means we're all good to go and if it's blinking Amber and green something is really wrong it needs to be reset up so let's go ahead and try setting this device up for the first time now there are a number of ways you can set up the airport express you can do so using the airport utility either on your Mac or PC or you can use an iOS device like I have here so we're going to use our iPad you can also use your iPhone or iPod Touch now the airport express can be used either in the in the traditional sense which is to set up a wireless access point so connect your ISP directly to it and you have a wireless access point like any other router you can also use this in bridge mode which basically takes your existing Network so it can connect to your existing wireless network and Bridge them uh so basically you turn your wireless network into a wired network uh so that's great for things that don't have wireless capabilities but have an ethernet port like a printer or an AV receiver or maybe the old Xbox so you get the idea the other option here is to use range extender range extender basically allows you to take your existing wireless network and extend the range of it so it's able to connect to your existing Network and broadcast a stronger signal in a weaker area so that's great for example you have a large house and want to uh extend the range in a weaker area so in order to set up the airport express on an iOS device just tap settings go to your Wi-Fi settings and make sure Wi-Fi is turned on now what you should see here is the airport base station and that will automatically show up as soon as you plug it in because it's broadcasting a Wi-Fi network you do not need to be connected to an existing Wi-Fi network in order for this to work that's just uh incidental so let's go ahead and tap on our wireless base station here and it's going to go ahead and connect to it now it automatically connects to the airport express and it sees the time capsule on my network so it sees my existing access point now I have an option here I can extend this network which is recommended because really that's the only thing it can do here it's not connected to an ISP it's not connected to any other devices so it's just a wireless Standalone device right now so this is the best option you can also go to other options here go to next and here you can create a new network which again if you uh disconnect an i ASP cable to it you can create a new network you can add to an existing Network which is what I want to do or you can replace an existing device so if you have another Airport Express it will transfer those uh settings right to your Airport Express so for example my old Airport Express all I have to do is transfer that but I'm going to leave that disconnected and do it the oldfashioned way and we're going to extend the range of the network go to next type in my password all right so it's joining the Time Capsule waiting for the airport base station all right so that's all there is to it Airport Express is now wirelessly extending the Time Capsule and if you go to the device now you see the light is green so we're all set to go now we can also manage this using the airport utility although you can't use it to set up a new device you can basically take a look at the existing devices so you see a grid here we have the internet connection which indicates it's strong we have our time capsule which is our access point and then we have the airport base station which is in bridge mode indicated by this dotted line so we can tap on that see our IP address see our connection speed or connection strength we can see the wireless clients connected to it so we can see a lot of information here so again the airpo utility is a free app so that works pretty good again that also works on all iOS devices so let's go ahead and test one of the features out AirPlay now with the airport express on my home network I can now access it as an AirPlay device so for example if I go to my iPhone here which is connected to that same network this also works with iPad or with iTunes on a Mac or PC so all you have to do is tap this AirPlay icon and you can now see Michael's AirPort Base Station so if we tap phone click play you hear it's playing through the phone I tap AirPlay send it to the airport base station it's now playing on my speakers now basically my iOS device becomes the remote control all right guys so that is the new airport express from Apple thanks for watching and I'll see you again in the next videohey guys this is Mike the Detroit BG with a look at the second generation Apple AirPort Express base station this is the first time this product has received an allnew upgrade since 2004 when it debuted so it's been a long time now if you're familiar with the old model basically was this thing that looked like Apple's wall wart or power adapter for a MacBook Pro so you had folding out a power prong so you can connect this directly to a wall adapter or you can add an extension cable uh to it so you can extend the range but basically this was a networking solution basically a compact version of the airport express it was designed to be portable so you could take this to a hotel room for example connect it to the wired internet and have a wireless access network for your laptop we also have a USB connector here for connecting a printer and a audio output for connecting uh devices such as your AV receiver for broadcasting AirPlay audio from your iOS device or your Mac now the airport express retains a lot of those features and adds a few more so this now has dual band support so it supports both 2.4 and 5 GHz networks of course supports Wireless and networking speeds on the back you can see we have a diagram of exactly what's on the back of the device we'll take a look at that once we get it out of the box all right so let's go ahead and crack open the plastic and take a look all right so all we have to do is slide out the airport express and there it is basically looks like a white version of the Apple TV we have a little tab here to lift it up so you can see it's wrapped in plastic and we're going to take a look at that in just a minute designed by Apple and California with a nice little tab here to pull up this cardboard and here is that very neatly wound up cable again just like the packaging of the Apple TV white instead of black and uh below that is the airport express setup guide so we have the airport express setup guide with step-by-step instructions although it's pretty easy to do so so you can see the what each Port means your accessories that sort of thing we have the airport express regulatory certificate and limited warranty no Apple stickers because this is an accessory so generally they don't come with them now let's go ahead and peel off this plastic and slide it out so we have another piece of plastic again just like the Apple TV wrapping the edge of it so we just need to peel this back you see it's very shiny white plastic covering the back of the ports and there we go now taking a look around you can see we have our shiny Apple logo surrounded by the sort of matte etched finish along the side we have that glossy white finish on the front we have an LED indicator which tells us our Network status along the back we have our power connector our W port for connecting our ISP we have a l port for connecting other network devices a USB port for connecting a printer for wireless printing we also have our audio jack which supports both to link Optical or analog we also have our little reset button here for resetting the device back to our factory defaults on the bottom we have our pedestal which again just like the Apple TV sort of raise it circular keeps it off the surface of the table with our Apple logo and it kind of has a textured finish to it so it helps to uh keep it secure on a desktop now just to compare the previous and current generation model you can see the airport express has changed substantially in its form factor these used to be sort of a traveling wireless access point so you can connect this to a wall adapter you don't need any sort of wire or cable to carry with you now this of course needs an separate cable which you'll need to carry with you so this is really I don't think designed to be portable it's not as necessary as it used to be uh but if you look at the ports there are a few differences here as well so we have only one land port here but now we have a w and landan Port here so you can either have both an ISP and a separate device connected to it this used to be one or the other now we we have two we still have one USB port both for wireless printing so you can connect a USB printer so every device in your house can have access to it Windows PC iOS device we also have our analog SL optical audio output so again these are combination ports you have to buy separate adapter if you want to use the optical function but again these are for AirPlay so you can connect your AV receiver and have full digital audio from your iTunes account on your Mac or PC or from your iOS device for AirPlay audio so it works quite well and then we still have our reset button to reset everything back to factory default now as I said this basically looks like a white version of the Apple TV so the design and construction are almost identical so again we have the shiny logos on top with that matte finish around it on the side we have that glossy finish so black and white same thickness on the bottom we have that pedestal design so that circular pedestal design with the Apple logo and we even have an LED indicator which is sort of hidden on the Apple TV uh and on the white one you'll see it of course they're very different devices so they have very different ports but otherwise very similar in design our next step here is to connect it and set it up now with the airport express connected we can see our LED indicator so when it's a solid Amber it's telling us that it's booting up when it's blinking Amber it's telling us it needs to be set up or it's not working properly solid green means we're all good to go and if it's blinking Amber and green something is really wrong it needs to be reset up so let's go ahead and try setting this device up for the first time now there are a number of ways you can set up the airport express you can do so using the airport utility either on your Mac or PC or you can use an iOS device like I have here so we're going to use our iPad you can also use your iPhone or iPod Touch now the airport express can be used either in the in the traditional sense which is to set up a wireless access point so connect your ISP directly to it and you have a wireless access point like any other router you can also use this in bridge mode which basically takes your existing Network so it can connect to your existing wireless network and Bridge them uh so basically you turn your wireless network into a wired network uh so that's great for things that don't have wireless capabilities but have an ethernet port like a printer or an AV receiver or maybe the old Xbox so you get the idea the other option here is to use range extender range extender basically allows you to take your existing wireless network and extend the range of it so it's able to connect to your existing Network and broadcast a stronger signal in a weaker area so that's great for example you have a large house and want to uh extend the range in a weaker area so in order to set up the airport express on an iOS device just tap settings go to your Wi-Fi settings and make sure Wi-Fi is turned on now what you should see here is the airport base station and that will automatically show up as soon as you plug it in because it's broadcasting a Wi-Fi network you do not need to be connected to an existing Wi-Fi network in order for this to work that's just uh incidental so let's go ahead and tap on our wireless base station here and it's going to go ahead and connect to it now it automatically connects to the airport express and it sees the time capsule on my network so it sees my existing access point now I have an option here I can extend this network which is recommended because really that's the only thing it can do here it's not connected to an ISP it's not connected to any other devices so it's just a wireless Standalone device right now so this is the best option you can also go to other options here go to next and here you can create a new network which again if you uh disconnect an i ASP cable to it you can create a new network you can add to an existing Network which is what I want to do or you can replace an existing device so if you have another Airport Express it will transfer those uh settings right to your Airport Express so for example my old Airport Express all I have to do is transfer that but I'm going to leave that disconnected and do it the oldfashioned way and we're going to extend the range of the network go to next type in my password all right so it's joining the Time Capsule waiting for the airport base station all right so that's all there is to it Airport Express is now wirelessly extending the Time Capsule and if you go to the device now you see the light is green so we're all set to go now we can also manage this using the airport utility although you can't use it to set up a new device you can basically take a look at the existing devices so you see a grid here we have the internet connection which indicates it's strong we have our time capsule which is our access point and then we have the airport base station which is in bridge mode indicated by this dotted line so we can tap on that see our IP address see our connection speed or connection strength we can see the wireless clients connected to it so we can see a lot of information here so again the airpo utility is a free app so that works pretty good again that also works on all iOS devices so let's go ahead and test one of the features out AirPlay now with the airport express on my home network I can now access it as an AirPlay device so for example if I go to my iPhone here which is connected to that same network this also works with iPad or with iTunes on a Mac or PC so all you have to do is tap this AirPlay icon and you can now see Michael's AirPort Base Station so if we tap phone click play you hear it's playing through the phone I tap AirPlay send it to the airport base station it's now playing on my speakers now basically my iOS device becomes the remote control all right guys so that is the new airport express from Apple thanks for watching and I'll see you again in the next video\n"