Time Capsule questions? New House (speed and additional hd)

[DaGrandMastah]

Hi all,

So my wife and I just bought a new house which is roughly 2300 sq feet. It has a basement, 1st and 2nd floor.....we are looking to invest our money in a 3 tb Time Capsule to use as a backup device. If I place the Time Capsule on the main floor will the signal reach enough to the 2nd floor and basement? Do I need to buy an extender to boost the signal? Most of the stuff I've been reading seems to indicate that it should do just fine.

Also, while we're on the subject of Time Capsule....can I buy another hard drive to connect to the Time Capsule to store my movies? The problem I have right now is that all of my movies are stored on the internal HD on my imac so if I want to watch a movie on my HD i have to ensure the Mac is on instead of stand by. Would I be able to circumvent that by storing the movies on a seperate hard drive connected to the time capsule?

 

[edk99]

Your first issue with the placement of the time capsule and the signal reaching the 2nd floor and basement. There are a several things that that factor into the strength of signal you will get on different floors or even on the same floor of a house. Most of this has to do with distance and construction of the house and other interference that may be between the TC and where you are trying to access it. Until you test this for yourself it is impossible to know how successful you will be.

If you find yourself with a weak signal you could try relocating the TC to a different part of the 1st floor. IF that is still not getting you the desired results you can then try a power line adaptor http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...Description=powerline+adaptor&N=-1&isNodeId=1 and connect that to a wi-fi access point or connect it directly. I use one for my apple TV and it works great streaming netflix and hulu.

Yes you can connect an external HD to a TC for extended storage to whatever you want to put on it.

 

[blueroom]

My advice, get an Airport Extreme and a Synology NAS. If you need extenders just add an Airport Express or two. As a bonus the expresses also make for easy Airplay audio players (just add amplified speakers).

Note: if you do need extenders make all efforts to run Ethernet cables from the AEBS to the APEs.

 

[DaGrandMastah]

Your first issue with the placement of the time capsule and the signal reaching the 2nd floor and basement. There are a several things that that factor into the strength of signal you will get on different floors or even on the same floor of a house. Most of this has to do with distance and construction of the house and other interference that may be between the TC and where you are trying to access it. Until you test this for yourself it is impossible to know how successful you will be.

If you find yourself with a weak signal you could try relocating the TC to a different part of the 1st floor. IF that is still not getting you the desired results you can then try a power line adaptor http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...Description=powerline+adaptor&N=-1&isNodeId=1 and connect that to a wi-fi access point or connect it directly. I use one for my apple TV and it works great streaming netflix and hulu.

Yes you can connect an external HD to a TC for extended storage to whatever you want to put on it.

Well for what it's worht, the house is a new construction (built in 2010) but makes sense what you said. I'll have to see this thing in action before I give it a go. I know my sister has a regular verizon router in her (much larger) house and they don't have signal problems at all so hopefully that's all I need.

I may look into buying a separate HD to store my movies.

Thanks for the links.

Another question, does my mac have to be on in order for Apple TV to access my library? I ripped a lot of my old DVD's for streaming...would I be able to stream those movies, from a NAS connected to my Time Capsule, without turning on my Mac?

 

[DaGrandMastah]

any other experiences?

 

[ksb315]

I actually just got the 2tb time capsule and i'm pretty impressed with the range the thing gets. I have a 1600sq ft house, that is mostly lath and plaster construction, and gets bad cell phone reception most of the time, with the time capsule located on the middle of the first floor I get full or mostly full reception around the entire property (inside and out). Never had that with any other wifi router to date. Just my two cents.

 

[ColdCase]

Hi all,

So my wife and I just bought a new house which is roughly 2300 sq feet. It has a basement, 1st and 2nd floor.....we are looking to invest our money in a 3 tb Time Capsule to use as a backup device. If I place the Time Capsule on the main floor will the signal reach enough to the 2nd floor and basement? Do I need to buy an extender to boost the signal? Most of the stuff I've been reading seems to indicate that it should do just fine.

Also, while we're on the subject of Time Capsule....can I buy another hard drive to connect to the Time Capsule to store my movies? The problem I have right now is that all of my movies are stored on the internal HD on my imac so if I want to watch a movie on my HD i have to ensure the Mac is on instead of stand by. Would I be able to circumvent that by storing the movies on a seperate hard drive connected to the time capsule?

I have a 5000 sq ft house, spread out and over three floors. The new version time capsule (located about 1/3 center) covers the entire house and basement with decent signal. My previous generation TC had some issues in a couple corners and bed rooms. Its black art, however, and your mileage may varry. You will have to try it to see for yourself.

You can attach one (or a number of USB drives via a hub) to the TC... and share the drive and the files therein if you like. The TC will not transcode movies, its not a computer nor can it run iTunes to stream to an AppleTV. If you were using iTunes on your mac and sharing, you will need to continue to do so. Those that have massive amounts of video typically look at a low end refurb mac mini and Airport Extreme combo instead of a TC. Don't settle for a NAS if video sharing/streaming is your end objective and you have apple devices.