Comments on: Time Capsule Review

By: Terry White

Terry White — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 15:06:47 +0000

Are you making sure the external drive is included in the backup in the Time Machine system prefs?

By: Stu

Stu — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 14:46:40 +0000

Hello,

I have:

MacBook Air (with a full HD of music and photos),
An external hard drive (approx 100GB of photos)
500GB Time Capsule

What I would like to do is back the external HD to the TC but when the TC updates with the external HD plug into it doesn’t back it up. Does anyone know why or what I need to do to back up an external drive to a TC?

Also, as the music and photos I have are too big for the AirBook HD do I need to plug an additional external HD into the TC and use that as my day to day HD and the TC as a back up…is this normal/how it is supposed to work?

Thanks,

Stu

By: Paul

Paul — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 16:59:06 +0000

Hi Terry,

Thanks for a great write up. I was wondering if you might be able to help me. I have a 1TB TC connected via Ethernet to my Imac G5 and to my Apple TV All works well until I try to run it WIFI.

My network picks up the TC no problem and my iTunes picks up my Apple Tv no problem but when I try to access my iTunes Library on my Apple TV the library is greyed-out meaning it’s not available. I’ve tried everything from resetting my network, resetting my iTunes Library location.

It appears that the signal isn’t strong enough but my Mac and TC is in direct sight of my Apple TV about 8 feet away. It has worked intemittently so not sure what else I can try.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Paul

By: Paul

Paul — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 01:23:39 +0000

I read your review and due, in part to it, I purchased a 1TB version. I’m a bit disappointed. I am in the process of the initial backup and it has apparently excluded my external HD that I have plugged into my iMac. I tried to remove it from the "excluded" list without success. I called Apple and they told me that TC/TM does not do that. I would have to copy each file to my internal drive and then run TM again. Since my internal drive is 150 and my external is 500, this isn’t going to work. I thought you said that this was the best/easiest. Not so far.

By: Lionel

Lionel — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 16:30:31 +0000

First you need to enter Time Machine. Once in it, use the Finder’s search box to perform a search. It relies on Spotlight and yes it’s mighty.

By: marco

marco — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 16:53:40 +0000

HOW CAN YOU DO A SPOTLIGHT SEARCH ON TIMECAPSULE?
please tell me.
becouse I can’t..

By: Eric

Eric — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 14:44:06 +0000

Terry,

Very good review. I got a 500GB time capsule and I have about 60GB of pictures on my MacBook HD. Although backing up “standard” files is fast, it takes ages for Time machine to back-up my iPhoto library every time I download some new pictures (almost every week-end).

Do ou know a good photo management software that would NOT generate 1 single file for the whole library?

Thanks in advance for your reply.
Eric

By: terrywhite

terrywhite — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 12:34:47 +0000

Calvin, TC doesn’t lend itself to offsite backups. So to be safe, you’d also do an occasional backup to an external hard drive (using SuperDuper for example) and put that drive in an offsite location. My offsite server backups are stored in a safe deposit box at the bank.

By: Calvin

Calvin — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 20:34:44 +0000

Mr. T.

What do you do for offsite storage DRA for the Time Capsule device? You did not include that in your review. (Not that you had to)

By: Robert Prins

Robert Prins — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 04:17:06 +0000

Thanks so much Terry for answering all my time machine questions. I’m sold now, I have two laptops and a iMac to back up so this will be perfect and painless. I’m starting to think your product reviews are my favorite now, they are always short, to the point and so unbiased and dead on, with even suggestions to make things better. Way to go Terry – you rock!

Rob

By: Norm Armour

Norm Armour — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 17:25:37 +0000

Terry,

My network is completely wired. Cable Modem > Old Airport Extreme > Gigabit Switch > Computers.

I used to use the Airport extreme for WIFI but have now run an ethernet cable to the upstairs Mac.

Will Time Capsule work better [faster] as a wired system for Time Machine?

Thanks for your response.

Norm

By: Matt E

Matt E — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 23:50:33 +0000

Good write up. I just upgraded from AEBS to the Time Capsule 500 GB. I have two new iMacs, and two Mac Minis. While “my” Mac was being backed up with Time Machine, my kids’ Macs and the other two were not. After evaluating Time Machine since Nov, it is simply put…perfert! So I took the plunge and am now backing up all my Macs to Time Capsule (OK, to clarify, Time Machine is backing up my Macs…I’m not…and that’s the point!) Since Nov., I’ve had to retrieve two files I deleted from days or weeks ago…and I brought up Time Machine, search, and poof, restored the files. Apple has a winner here because everyone should get a external drive or Time Capsule. To “janp”, I’d recommend the 500 GB Time Capsule. I noticed when using Time Machine on my one Mac with an external drive, the first backup was just under 200 GB (basically, all of the drive) but then the increment backups are megabytes…so using more than 200 GB will take a very long time. If you add GB to your computer every day, then you may want to get the 1 TB drive. heck, even a CD or two a week ripped into iTunes is only 10′s of MB. You need a whole lot of data, or many Macs, to require the 1 TB Time Capsule. Again, I have four Macs, three used “normally” for household use and one with music, photos, etc., and they all fit very easily on the 500 GB Time Capsule. I’m very pleased and highly recommend it for Mac users!

By: terrywhite

terrywhite — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 23:48:36 +0000

janp,
you should be fine with Time Machine and an external hard drive.

By: janp

janp — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 22:41:48 +0000

Nice review TW,,so for the average MC Pro user,,,, Time Machine sounds like a winner,,,, in other words does the average Joe with only a mere 60 G of music need the rather pricey time capsule?

By: Steve K.

Steve K. — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 18:12:53 +0000

Since you did in fact discuss hooking up additional storage to the Time Capsule, the approach I’ve heard that will work is to just get the “small-cheap” Time Capsule, then hook up a large USB RAID drive to it. The Time Machine software will see it and you can use that as your back up drive. This is what most people wanted t do with the Base Station, but were restricted when Leopard finally shipped. This way, you can still use the Time Capsule built-in drive as your iTunes Server and have it backed up to the RAID in addition to backing up your Mac. Then if a drive fails on the RAID, you can just swap it for another one without losing any data.