Chosen Solution
Im having this issue with my Airport Extreme base, and its that it would respond to any soft or hard reset. Both failed. I know that for a hard reset you need to keep holding the reset button while connecting it to the electricity. But it wont respond to this. I opened to check if the reset button was broken or anything, but i can see that is firmly soldiered to the main board. The issue is that when connecting it, the front led will go to green, without blinking or anything, just plain green. I tried while having the ethernet cable connected or disconnected. My computer wont detect any WiFi coming from the Airport Extreme Base. PS i dont have any valid warranty on the Airport Extreme Base
Can you see the base station via the Ethernet connection (directly to your mac or via an Ethernet hub) using the Airport utility program? If you can you should be able to reset it or at least see what your WiFi settings are.
I just bought Apple AE gen 5 from craiglist in Dallas, talked with Apple Support 3 or 4 times and reset for 30 - 60 mins. Went Apple Store today in Dallas for genius app for MacBook Pro and they said it was a hardware issue, I’m self taught tech for a few years and would NOT take that for an answer. Opened the unit up by 5 screws under pad an found the RESET SWITCH BROKEN LOSE FROM CIRCUIT BOARD, shorted out the terminals where the switch was mounted. RESET THE APPLE AIRPORT EXTREME WITHIN 30 SEC. Best $50 dollars I’ve every spent. DON’T LISTEN TO TECH SUPPORT, EVERYONE SOULD TRY THIS 1ST.
A solid green status LED is normal. Unless you used the AirPort Utility to change this LED to blink on activity, it should remain solid and not blinking. Ref: AirPort base stations: About AirPort base station status lights (LED)
