Time Capsule failure - recommendations for new one?

[oxgoldilox]

My 2 years young Time Capsule died peacefully overnight some weeks back and having lost complete faith in TCs I wonder if anyone has any recommendations for external hard drives to back up my macs to?

I'm after 500GB-1TB mostly to store photos to free up my ageing iMac's hard drive. And I'm in the UK if that makes any difference.

Many thanks.

 

[eric44]

Mine died too.
I was concened about buying another one given heat and reliability issues.
I bought an airport extreme and attached a Synology DS212 NAS to it via ethernet.
Total cost £530 for a twin 2TB drive solution with router so not cheap.
Works very well though, the NAS is very quiet and cool so the drives have a better chance of a long life...

 

[goy091]

I'm running a Synology DS209J (2009 model) 2 bay NAS with 2x 2TB HDD's in RAID 1. You can run Time Machine on the NAS, as well as a whole host of apps for your i-devices to control/use the NAS.

I'd recommend a DS212J, the 2012 model, they also have a DS212 and DS212+ which are faster but more expensive. These are 2 bay models, but you can start off only using one HDD and add a second one for redundancy or additional storage. They also make, 1, 4, 15 etc. bay models.

I use Time Machine on the Disk Station to backup my Macs, as well as store all my mp3's, videos, pics and program images. I also stream mp3's and movies to my ipad, iphone and MBA while I'm on the go using the Synology apps in the app store.

I also use an Asus RT-N56U dual band router while at home. Makes backing up to the Disk Station faster using a 5GHz N wireless since my MBA has a 5GHz N wifi capability.

Here's a nice blog by someone using a Mac and Synology DS.
http://macsynology.wordpress.com/

If you're purely looking for just an external HDD, I've had success using the WD my book series on other family members Macs.

 

[oxgoldilox]

Thanks for your replies guys. All helps towards making a decision.

 

[nsfw]

The 2011 Time Capsule is a lot better and I noticed the 2TB model is $184 at Bestbuy.com refurbished. Probably a limited discount price.

 

[mikepro]

FYI, if you happen to have Applecare coverage on a current mac product, it will likely extend coverage to your Time Capsule. If you do, you may get Apple to replace it for free.