Airport Hard Drive Performance

[ClemTiger0408]

I am considering purchasing a Airport BSE.

I currently have a D-link DIR-655. To begin with, most of the time, my Macbook Pro won't pick up the external HD that I have connected to the router because the Dlink SharePoint software is terrible. Secondly, when it does work, the performance is terrible. I'd say it is probably worse than half the speed of plugging the drive directly into the MBP.

Now I realize there will be a performance degradation when attaching an external HD to the ABSE, but my question is, how much are we talking? A percentage terms (rough estimate is fine) would be the best.

Like, lets say it takes 30 seconds to transfer a 1gb file when the external HD is connected directly into my MBP via USB (hypothetical, it probably takes longer) how long would you guess would it take when its over the network?

Additionally, can an Xbox 360 or PS3 read from the HD over the network?

 

[ClemTiger0408]

Does no one have any experience with this?

All I want to know is the USB hard drive speed.

 

[SqB]

the ps3 cannot read directly from the drive. i use a ps3 media server on my mini to serve files off the hard drive on the abex. as for performance, there is certainly a hit on the speed. it's fast enough for backups, but it's not something you're going to want to use for major storage of video files or anything. i will try to run some tests when i get home later to see if i can get you some kind of numbers.

 

[ClemTiger0408]

So just as an FYI, I went ahead and purchased the AEBS last night.

In an initial test, a 1gb file took about 1 minute to transfer from the MPB to the HD. Not bad at all. I don't have a % difference, but it is certainly fast enough to be useful.

 

[SqB]

Great, you won't be disappointed. I never did get around to running any speed tests, but I was going to tell you that it's only a little bit slower than usb2.0. Not quite as slow as 1.0, but not fast either.

Enjoy the ABEX.