Accessing Time Capsule hard drive wirelessly from PC

[jphealy]

I've just bought and set up a Time Capsule that I'm using with my MacBook. My girlfriend uses my old Dell laptop. Can she access (read and write to) the Time Capsule hard drive wirelessly? If so, how do you set this up? The dell laptop is currently accessing the internet through the TC.

Thanks for any help!

 

[jsgreen]

I've just bought and set up a Time Capsule that I'm using with my MacBook. My girlfriend uses my old Dell laptop. Can she access (read and write to) the Time Capsule hard drive wirelessly? If so, how do you set this up? The dell laptop is currently accessing the internet through the TC.

Thanks for any help!

Would like to hear if you figured out how to do this?

 

[skorpien]

Two ways to do this. Either set up AirPort Utility for Windows and use AirPort Base Station Agent to connect to your Time Capsule's HDD, or set up the workgroup in your AirPort Utility under Disks > File Sharing (make sure it's the same workgroup that the PC is a part of).

With the latter method though, you have to make absolute sure that any software firewalls on your PC aren't blocking your Time Capsule network. Add the TC's IP address to trusted networks/zones. If you don't, even if it's on the same workgroup, your computer will not see the HDD... or any other networked computers/drives on the network.

 

[mkaake]

The software install disc that comes with the TC can be run on your windows box... I can't remember exactly what I went through, but if memory serves, once you install the software, you get a TC thingy down in your system tray, from which you can opt to connect to the shared drive. Tell it you want to share, put in the password, and it's connected as a networked drive on your machine.

Very simple and straightforward.

 

[jphealy]

I did manage to get it set up alright. It was just a case of installing the cd that was included on the windows machine. For some reason, the install wasn't successful the first time - that's when I posted the question. Tried it again though and worked no problem. Just had to enter the password and I was ready to go.

Thanks!

 

[jace88]

Out of interest what format is the drive? FAT?

 

[waw74]

Out of interest what format is the drive? FAT?

holy resurrected threads batman.

from the apple knowledge base

The AirPort Extreme (802.11n) and Time Capsule support USB storage devices that are formatted as Mac OS Extended (HFS-plus), FAT16, or FAT32. Formatting a storage device as Mac OS Extended with journaling is recommended, as it may provide some more resilience if the device is removed or powered down while in use.

keep in mind, the drive only needs to be readable by the device it's directly connected to. so even if you're sharing to a windows machine it doesn't have to be FAT, it can be HFS, and the airport will read the drive, and share it in a way that windows understands.