TIME CAPSULE- stuck on 'preparing' please help

[jk000]

Hi guys would really like your help on this,

I recently completed an initial backup with my time capsule wired with an ethernet cable to my macbook pro. It completed the backup problem free overnight. After unplugging the ethernet cable and leaving the time capsule to work completely wirelessly I have started having problems.

Incremental backups: When my time capsule and mac try and backup it begins with 'preparing' however this sticks and fails after a couple of hours. After speaking with Apple support over the phone, they said it was due to my third party router and the settings not working with each other (router and time capsule).

I was told that I could either hardwire the time capsule via ethernet, but this completely defeats the object of having a time capsule or I could have the current router as a modem and have the time capsule as the router, which is also not possible.

I could really really use some help on this, so any thoughts at all would be GREATLY appreciated, thanks.


[Router: Sky Broadband, Time Capsule 1TB, Mac: MacBook Pro mid 2008]

 

[skorpien]

Is the Time Capsule running in bridge mode? Also, make sure that the TC's name and the HDD's name are short (8 characters or less, alpha-numeric only so no symbols, spaces, other characters).

And how is your TC connected to the router? Is it hard wired or joining wirelessly?

 

[jk000]

Sorry I don't know what 'bridge mode' is, is this when the time capsule is joined to a current wireless network?

It's wirelessly joined to the router and joined to my mac wirelessly.

TC's name : Jack's Time Capsule
I'm not sure what the HDD's name is, I assume it's Jack or something along those lines.

Is this any help?

 

[skorpien]

Alright, well you've somewhat answered my questions I'll try to help as best as I can. Right now your TC is joined as a wireless device to your current wireless network. Bridge mode only applies when you join the TC via ethernet cable to a current router and wish to turn off TC's routing capabilities (as to allow the original router to do the routing and the TC to only act as a gateway).

What I would suggest you do first is to change the name of your TC and its HDD. Go into manual setup (AirPort Utility > Manual Setup) and in the AirPort tab under the Time Capsule subtab, you'll see a field that you can change the name of the Time Capsule. I'd suggest something short and sweet. TC01, <lastname>TC, <firstname>TC or something along those lines. Just keep it 8 characters or shorter. Also, in the Disks tab under the Disks subtab, you can select the hard drive and rename that as well. Again, something short and sweet. People have been reporting issues with longer names and Time Machine backups. I had issues myself which were resolved when I renamed my Time Capsule and its HDD.

Lastly, if that doesn't work, would you be able to wire your Time Capsule to your current router? Do you NEED it to be far away from the router or can you keep it in the same room? If you can, run an ethernet cable from one of the current router's LAN ports to your TC's WAN port (flower, not <...>). Then in manual setup, under the Internet tab, turn Connection Sharing to Off (Bridge Mode). This allows your original router to handle DHCP, NAT and other routing services and just allows your TC to become another wireless and wired gateway. You can run a separate wireless network on your TC (for example, wireless N only 5 GHz) and still be able to access files and computers running on the other router's network. I've set mine to broadcast a wireless N network and my old router to broadcast a b/g network. This way any b/g devices that join won't slow down any N devices.

 

[jk000]

I've tried your suggestions and they seem like they're just not working for me today.

I've changed the name of both the time capsule and the HDD to no more than 5 characters. It still keeps hanging on 'preparing'.

I might try changing the router, I've got a decent NetGear router that I've never set up and that's meant to be a good one so hopefully that might talk with the time capsule.

Thanks skorpien for your help, really appreciated.

 

[skorpien]

Anytime. Hopefully you get your issue resolved. Let me know what happens.

Also, if you haven't already you may want to create an account at the Apple Discussion Forums and see if you can find help there.