Time Capsule vs. External Hard Drive?

[DoFoT9]

Besides the other negative points, AE and TC are very slow for disk transfers. Get a good NAS enclosure.

200MB/s read&write performance is slow? (via GB)

That inexpensive device looks interesting--wish someone with experience with it could post. I believe (but can't say for sure) that both it and the Airport Extreme would allow multiple USB drives to be connected by using a USB hub. I believe this because I have a Time Capsule with an old 1.1 USB hub plugged into it, and my USB printer and USB memory stick plugged into the hub. Works fine for me.

AFAIK, you can't daisy chain USB devices like you do FireWire devices, but you can use multiple USB hubs to attach some large number of USB devices to one USB port.

thats correct yes, you can attach hubs to expand the number of devices - but it doesnt really support daisies (not on the TC anyway)

I know there are some NAS which claim Time Machine compatibility (I'm not sure if over the network). The key point I as asking about is if there is any NAS which can use HFS+ formatted disks, so that they can be repaired by Mac tools like DiskWarrior (maybe via direct attachment).

kind of hard because it means the NAS has to support afp most likely as well for networked backups, as well as HFS+.

 

[cube]

200MB/s read&write performance is slow? (via GB)

kind of hard because it means the NAS has to support afp most likely as well for networked backups, as well as HFS+.

It's megabits, not megabytes. That's 25 MB/s. Double as they previous version, but still very slow.

The LaCie NAS's can be formatted as HFS+ with DiskUtility.

 

[DoFoT9]

It's megabits, not megabytes. That's 25 MB/s. Double as they previous version, but still very slow.

ARGH! i got fooled! such a fool i am. i knew it was too good to be true.

that doesnt make any sense though..its clearly the TCs problem, not the HDDs. i hit 20.7MB/s copying a file.

that really annoys me. ahwell

The LaCie NAS's can be formatted as HFS+ with DiskUtility.

i have a LaCie drive - it didnt work when i formatted as HFS+ i hope the support is better now!

 

[cube]

Is there any HFS+ NAS with acceptable performance?

 

[b8b]

Note that backing up to a generic NAS device is not supported. It can work (I have been doing it for years) but corruption of your backups is not unheard of, and configuring it in the first place can be a bit of a hassle. It may also be broken at OS upgrades, as happened with Snow Leopard where I had to scrap my old backups and start new.

I had attached a couple of 500 GB drives inside of a fairly cheap enclosure to the AE, and after some massaging, (not officially supported by Apple) got Time Machine to work just fine backing up my MBP. I have a wireless printer, and don't worry about backing up my Windows machine, given that all of my important data is now on my Mac (see Apple servitude statement above). After a while the cheap enclosure went belly up and, rather than deal with another enclosure on the AE I just went all in with the 2TB Time Capsule. Hooked it up and it's been working flawlessly since.

But a NAS type solution, i.e. Time Capsule or AE with tethered USB drive, is really the way to go with a MacBook.

So how is it working?

I am still trying to figure out the best budget/performance solution to share media and backup using Time Capsule. I am still on PC, but about to buy 3 MBP's for the family to switch over completely. I need a solid/reliable/easy backup solution. I do have some IT skills, but I'd rather spend my time on other things as learning the Mac stuff will be a time-consuming challenge enough in itself (though I know it will be less so than if I were learning PC's for the first time). Any/all advice and guidance is greatly appreciated.

 

[skipper1971]

My WD My Book just crashed. Need to get a new backup drive for TM which backs up my iMac.

I'm wondering if the Time Capsule wireless will be faster for internet than the Verizon Westell A90.

Any suggestions on how I determine that?

And if the TC is performing it's hourly backup, does that slow down wireless Internet?

thanks all.

 

[zhenya]

My WD My Book just crashed. Need to get a new backup drive for TM which backs up my iMac.

I'm wondering if the Time Capsule wireless will be faster for internet than the Verizon Westell A90.

Any suggestions on how I determine that?

And if the TC is performing it's hourly backup, does that slow down wireless Internet?

thanks all.

The Time Capsule is an 802.11N device, which has a realistic maximum throughput of about 50Mbps via its wireless radios (this is best case scenario, with an N-compatible client and no B or G clients on the same radio). This is among the fastest wireless routers available, FWIW.

The real question is, what is your Internet speed? Your Internet speed will only be limited if it is above 50Mbps and you are actually using ALL of that (very rare, except when file sharing). And yes, when TM is performing its backup, that bandwidth will be shared, so there would be less available for your Internet connection. In practice, this is unlikely to be noticeable unless you have a very fast Internet connection.

 

[Detrius]

Holy zombie thread, Batman!

Why didn't you just post a new thread??

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And yes, when TM is performing its backup, that bandwidth will be shared, so there would be less available for your Internet connection. In practice, this is unlikely to be noticeable unless you have a very fast Internet connection.

That's not entirely true. The WiFi is shared, but the internet connection itself will not be affected by backups. Any machine hardwired via ethernet to the Time Capsule or Airport Extreme will be unaffected by backups running from other machines.