A lot of Mac users seem to hit a wall with their AirPort Extreme base stations right after downloading and installing Apple's latest maintenance update for Leopard, Mac OS X 10.5.3. The most recent Apple Discussions thread dated June 2, 2008 (unfortunately) reveals this might be a widespread issue.

"After 'upgrading' to 10.5.3 I noticed that there was no AirDisk in my Finder list. I the tried to use the Airport tool to see if everything looked OK. The Airport tool can't find my Airport," writes Sadolin, accusing the 10.5.3 of "breaking" his AirPort Extreme.

Another user, equally disappointed with Apple's latest update, writes: "I'm having the exact same problem. My airport has never had a problem since I got this Macbook around December. As soon as I applied the 10.5.3 update, my connection began dropping every few minutes. My airport utility is also coming up with the 'no device' message as well."

More proof that AirPort Extreme base stations come into conflict with the Leopard update is provided by a user who claims he owns multiple Leopard-running machines and one running Tiger (Mac OS X 10.4.11). While the Intel-based MacBook running Tiger has no problems getting an ip-address via dhcp, all other Macs running Leopard (10.5.3) have the same problem: "i am having this here in my home. All Macs with 10.5.3 except our Intel MacBook share the problem with 10.5.3. All run well with 10.4.11, just when booted with 10.5.3 they can't get an ip-adress via dhcp - but with 10.4.11 it all runs well..."

Other users are reporting failed attempts to login to their e-mail accounts, Safari, or doing a software check update through the AirPort Extreme. Strange enough, the Mac owner reporting these last issues claims "Apple software said [he] should download and install 10.5.3 fixes" when he "was already running 10.5.3, with no problems." He noted, of course, that he was hoping "Apple comes up with a new fix real fast!"

How about you? Any ArPort issues after 10.5.3?