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How does 3.5" HDD fit into the new Time Capsule

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W

wmy5

macrumors 6502
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Oct 27, 2012
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upstate NY
The new TC's dimensions: 3.85 inches (98 mm) by 3.85 inches (98 mm) by 6.6 inches (168 mm)

A typical 3.5 HDD's: 4 inches by 1.03 inches by 5.79 inches

How can the new TC accommodate a 3.5" hard drive whose length is larger than the TC enclosure? Apple offers 3TB option so 2.5" HDD is not a possibility.

I am just curious...

Alright here is my guess: HDD is put in diagonal... interesting design..
 
Hmm that's an interesting observation. Maybe Apple has their own proprietary form factor that fits. That would sucks.

I want to get the Airport Extreme and pop my own hard drive in there. I'll have to wait until tomorrow when ifixit or someone gets one and does a disassembly.
 
portishead said:
Hmm that's an interesting observation. Maybe Apple has their own proprietary form factor that fits. That would sucks.

I want to get the Airport Extreme and pop my own hard drive in there. I'll have to wait until tomorrow when ifixit or someone gets one and does a disassembly.
Click to expand...

I was not clear from the info Apple provided that you could do that. Do you mean actually place your own HDD inside the new Extreme? It would be nice if that could be done.
 
Weaselboy said:
I was not clear from the info Apple provided that you could do that. Do you mean actually place your own HDD inside the new Extreme? It would be nice if that could be done.
Click to expand...

Apple didn't say you could do that. In fact, I'd probably bet on them NOT having the hardware to do it. On the flip side, Apple would have to manufacture 2 different designs, which might be more costly, so there is a chance. I use an external USB 2.0 drive anyway, it's not that big of a deal. I had the old school time capsule, and the heat dissipation was TERRIBLE.
 
portishead said:
Apple didn't say you could do that. In fact, I'd probably bet on them NOT having the hardware to do it. On the flip side, Apple would have to manufacture 2 different designs, which might be more costly, so there is a chance. I use an external USB 2.0 drive anyway, it's not that big of a deal. I had the old school time capsule, and the heat dissipation was TERRIBLE.
Click to expand...

Apple did not support Time Machine with an external USB drive on the last Extreme, I am curious to see if they support that setup on the new one.
 
Weaselboy said:
Apple did not support Time Machine with an external USB drive on the last Extreme, I am curious to see if they support that setup on the new one.
Click to expand...

Wait what? I have an older version, and I use a USB drive, and my Time Machine works fine. I think it's the version before the most recent one.
 
portishead said:
Wait what? I have an older version, and I use a USB drive, and my Time Machine works fine. I think it's the version before the most recent one.
Click to expand...

It is not supported on the current gen. Airport Extreme. If you look in your Lion or Mt. Lion help it will even warn you against it. It seems to work fine for some people, then is erratic for others. It is not officially supported by Apple. Don't know if it is an evil scheme to sell more Time Capsules or what.
 
I think you are looking at Airport Express. According to that list, all Airport Extremes support external USB drives, which means Time Machine SHOULD work fine.

AirPort Extreme 802.11ac & AirPort Extreme 802.11n (1st - 5th Generation)
A self-powered USB hard drive
A USB printer
A USB hub, which may be used to connect several USB hard drives and/or printers
 
There are 2.5 inch drives inside. Fast enough for network backups, lower power, too. I'd guess 1 or 2. We'll know the facts with pictures in a few days.
 
portishead said:
I think you are looking at Airport Express. According to that list, all Airport Extremes support external USB drives, which means Time Machine SHOULD work fine.

AirPort Extreme 802.11ac & AirPort Extreme 802.11n (1st - 5th Generation)
A self-powered USB hard drive
A USB printer
A USB hub, which may be used to connect several USB hard drives and/or printers
Click to expand...

Nope... I know the difference and I meant Extreme. This has been discussed in the forums before and it is a known issue with the Extreme.

Interesting thing I just discovered. If you look at the KB 2421 article it was updated June 11 (yesterday) and now shows the text you quoted. Essentially the same USB drive support for Time Capsule and an Extreme.

But if you look at the version of the page before today's update (screen shot below) it specifically only says TM support on a Time Capsule external USB drive.

JluwFz9.png


Look at this screen shot from Mt. Lion's help. Same thing... it specifically says not to use an Extreme with a USB drive for Time Machine.

dOvL2.png


I saw there was a firmware update for the existing AE and TC devices yesterday. So now I am thinking with this update they have removed the restriction of using a USB drive for TM with the Extreme (both old and new). :confused:
 
Interesting. I don't know then. I have been using my USB drive as a Time Machine backup for a year or two. Never had a problem, other than it's pretty slow. But it works reliably. I had it hooked up my a mac mini and the power kept cutting out. I tried using TM on my Synology NAS, but it was really buggy.

I guess I can see how it's not "technically" supported since I have to mount the drive on a desktop before TM will see the drive. After that it connects and backs up like normal.
 
Wild-Bill said:
Really? I use TM on my Synology DS1511+ to back up both my 08 Mac Pro and my MBA. No issues here.
Click to expand...

I tried a year ago or so, maybe longer. It's possible it works better now, but I have an extra USB drive anyway that does the job, and frees up space on the NAS, so I'm just as well off.
 
believlle said:
hi giuly, how did you get this pic, and there are more?
since it points to amazon cloud i can't see the real page it belongs to.

thank you.

----------



ok i got, ifixit, thank you all the same.
Click to expand...

Link please, I wanna see!!!!
 
believlle said:
http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/AirPort+Extreme+A1521+Teardown/15044/1

New TC and AE are using BCM5301 which is a high-end processor from broadcom, contains 2 arm a9 cores, i believe TC and AE have big performance improvement than previous generation.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the link. :)

Here is a good photo from the teardown showing how a drive would fit in. Interestingly, this is from the Airport Extreme teardown, and although there is space for a 3.5 inch drive, the MOBO has no connectors for the drive. So DIY Extreme to Time Capsule upgrades are a no go. It does look like it would be fairly simple to swap out your new Time Capsule drive.

VdrTrai.png
 
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