Time Capsule vs Base Station + external drive for time machine

[Mr.Bullitt]

Hi guys!


As my 160N series Linksys router neither has gigabit ports, usb connector or dual band networking, I am looking for a replacement.

When it comes to Apple routers I am looking at 2 options - either the base station with an external USB drive or get a 1TB capsule with the buildt in drive and worries regarding reliability.

What I like about the Time Capsule is that it is neat to have all in one, takes up less space and only has 1 plug to attach, while Iike the idea that I can just connect a bigger drive later on the base station solution.

1. Will the connected USB drive function just like the internal drive in the Time Capsule for Time Machine use?

2. Will everything be transparent to Snow Leopard?

3. In case of both units with an attached USB drive - can I control who actually can see the drive and access it?

4. Do they support this DNLA thing so that e.g . PS3 can access an attached drive??

Cheers!

 

[spinnerlys]

Hi guys!

1. Will the connected USB drive function just like the internal drive in the Time Capsule for Time Machine use?

2. Will everything be transparent to Snow Leopard?

3. In case of both units with an attached USB drive - can I control who actually can see the drive and access it?

4. Do they support this DNLA thing so that e.g . PS3 can access an attached drive??

Cheers!

I have an AEBS and although I currently don't use it in conjunction with Time Machine (TM - I have other means of backing up), you can do point 1, meaning using n external USB drive connected to the AEBS as a TM drive.

2. I don't know what you mean by transparent.

3. Yes, with Airport Utility.

4. I don't know about that.

Also know, that with a USB hub (passive or active) you can connect as many USB drives to the AEBS as you want and have access to them concurrently.

 

[Mr.Bullitt]

By transparent I mean that to my MBP a drive attache to the AEBS will look the same as the internal drive in the time capsule.

 

[spinnerlys]

By transparent I mean that to my MBP a drive attache to the AEBS will look the same as the internal drive in the time capsule.

I don't know how the Time Capsule looks like to a Mac in structure (or if it is even seen as an external HDD, but the connected HDD will look like any other HDD, just the icon resembles the network icons OS X uses and not the the ones symbolizing external HDDs.

 

[mmomega]

I'm not sure how much faster time capsule is than AEBS + external, read/write speeds i mean.

I have an AEBS and connected a new WD 1TB mybook external to get this same effect. I noticed the throughput to be very very slow on all computers; macbook and win7 computers.
I then attached the external to my main desktop and just set up the drive to be shared to the other computers, the read/write speeds almost doubled.

so
external ---> aebs ---> computers = slow throughput
external ---> computer ---> aebs ---> other computers = faster speeds

must be hardware limitations within the aebs itself that controls the usb to external that slows it down.

at first i thought it could be USB 2 speed vs. ethernet 1gigabit speed but the external is still connected to my main computer through USB.