Connect An AirPrint Wi-Fi Printer To An Airport Extreme Base Station

I’ve just got a new Wif-Fi/AirPrint-enabled printer and had to connect it to my network, powered by my AirPort Extreme Base Station. It was easy, but not obvious…

To say the instructions supplied by Canon are poor is an understatement. During the process of setting up my Canon MX895 Printer, I came to the Wireless LAN setup screen, telling me that I needed to hold the pairing button for 5 seconds on my router. I have an Apple AirPort Extreme Base Station and there are no physical buttons on the device. However, I have the AirPort Utility on my Mac and therein was the solution!

Open up the utility and click to select your base station:

Go to your AirPort Utility menu bar > Base Station > Add Wi-Fi Printer…

You will then see a window titled Wireless Client Setup Assistant, giving you two options: PIN or First Attempt. I chose the First Attempt option and my printer was found and connected straight away!