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APPLEFAN8

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Jun 30, 2007
1,183
3
NJ/GA/FL
Thinking about getting it for my macbook when I upgrade to leopard. I'm not sure what do you guys think?
 

mr.stinki

macrumors 6502
Jan 25, 2008
300
1
Well, i had a hard drive connected to my Airport Extreme, and it was an "ok" experience. Back-ups took a while (even when much wasn't being backed up) and the Time Machine App lagged a bit when accessing it. However, i was always backed up, and never had to worry about hooking up my hard drive to back-up.

It's up to you. Maybe the Pros outweigh the Cons. It was ok, but it got too laggy for me, and i just went to plugging in my HD through USB for Backups.
 

Solemony

macrumors 6502
Nov 26, 2008
474
0
Wonderland
I don't have one and don't need one right now....Besides I think it's a bit too expensive...I'd rather go with a regular external hard drive which cost much lesser than the Time Capsule.
 

Domanic

macrumors regular
Dec 11, 2008
143
0
Sussex, UK
You had an external HDD hooked up to an airport express? Via USB? I was under the impression that the usb port was just for printers... I might grab me an express now :eek:
 

LaJaca

macrumors regular
Nov 23, 2007
109
0
Near Seattle
I have an Iomega firewired to my iMac. When I bought my (late 08) macbook, I moved the Iomega to my airport extreme base station, via USB. I found it horrible for two reasons: 1) way slow and 2) it created a duplicate backup folder for the iMac. I never even bothered to set it up for my macbook.

So I disconnected everything, deleted the mirror backup, and put the Iomega back in the configuration I had before. For my macbook, since I don't use it as often, I'll wander upstairs and hard wire it (USB, no firewire this time) to the Iomega. It's a slight pain in the ass, but it works perfectly fine.

Had I NOT owned an external HD, I might have considered getting the TimeCapsule. Doing it via USB to airport station, while technically workable, is not worth the hassle for more than one mac needing backup.

My 2 cents.
 

skorpien

macrumors 68020
Jan 14, 2008
2,339
0
You had an external HDD hooked up to an airport express? Via USB? I was under the impression that the usb port was just for printers... I might grab me an express now :eek:

You read wrong. He said Extreme. The Express's USB port is for printers exclusively.
 

bluesTank

macrumors regular
Oct 21, 2008
181
0
I have one.

Looking back, I wish I hadn't payed $400 for essentially a wireless router. The hard drive feature is worthless, since I would much rather just back it up once a day, instead of once every hour...however you cannot set it to do that with time machine for SOME REASON
 

alphaod

macrumors Core
Feb 9, 2008
22,183
1,245
NYC
Wow. You are easily persuaded. You are a salesperson's dream.

You surely mean nightmare? :p

I bought one when they came out; the thing is very useful, but that's about it. It's slow; my first back up was going to take 2 weeks which didn't make sense. Also I noticed the network connection is slower on the TC than on other routers including the Airport Extreme.
 

Moocher

macrumors regular
Mar 5, 2008
222
0
NE Atlanta area
I've had a TC since shortly after they came out to go with my MB. I like the feeling of security, especially since I'm the backup-paranoid type, but I have not needed it yet. If you can afford it I recommend it. Otherwise, buy a cheap 320 laptop drive and an enclosure, use it for regular backups using carbon copy cloner or superduper, and have it on hand if you ever need to replace your internal drive.

Mooch
 

hogfaninga

macrumors 65816
Aug 16, 2008
1,305
0
Chestnut Tree Cafe
You surely mean nightmare? :p

I bought one when they came out; the thing is very useful, but that's about it. It's slow; my first back up was going to take 2 weeks which didn't make sense. Also I noticed the network connection is slower on the TC than on other routers including the Airport Extreme.

My first backup was slow, but after that it has been extremely fast. If you can't handle the stress of the wait of the first backup then the TC isn't for you. Heck if that stresses or pisses anyone off them most things will give them problems in life. Apple is very upfront about the first backup. It is well worth the price to me.
 

natebookpro

macrumors 6502a
Sep 25, 2008
539
16
Maryland
I love mine. It's like a nice warm security blanket. The first backup took some amount of time between when I went to sleep and when I woke up the next morning. It was about 150 gb and it took less than eight hours. After that it's just incremental so it doesn't take too long at all. I would definitly recommend it.
 

mikeyr0x

macrumors member
Oct 24, 2008
38
0
Just got mine this holiday season, love it with my airport express and air tunes in my garage.
Its a easy intuitive 'just works' approach to backups

You could go with a wireless router and NAS but the time capsule takes care of backups without any effort and allows you to rollback to specific times very easily.
 
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