RANDOM APPLE MEMORY
AirPort Express
Charlotte Henry recalls how Apple entered, then exited, the competitive world of internet routers
When connected to an Ethernet network, the AirPort Express base station provided wireless internet access.
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n 7 June 2004, Apple proudly unveiled AirPort Express. It was an 802.11g mobile base station that could be plugged into the wall, providing internet connections wherever you went. It’s hard to imagine now, but in 2004 ‘portable’ internet might required all sorts of cables and power supplies – it wasn’t as simple as opening up the hotspot provided by your iPhone then. Four years later, in March 2008, things improved further as Apple updated the AirPort Express, introducing the 802.11n wireless standard which it said delivered up to five times better performance than its predecessor. A second generation of the 802.11n arrived in June 2012.