Using external HDD for Time Machine...

[Tim3822]

I've got a 1TB hard drive which I've set up to be my time machine backup, which is great and it's working fine. However, I really wanted a wireless one but just couldn't afford it. Now I had a bit of a moment and thought "if I bought a wifi USB adapter could I do it wirelessly?"...

Well... could I? Simply plug in the USB adapter onto the hard drive and use the Wi-Fi built into my Macbook Pro (late 2010 model) and then have my time machine backups done wirelessly? I've read on google that this might not be possible, but unless I'm being dumb I don't see any issues? It would be really handy as I spend most of my time on the couch not at a desk so having the HDD attached is a bit of a nuisance.

Any help on this would be appreciated!

Regards,
Tim

 

[Tim3822]

55 views and no replies? Comon guys! Someone must know if it could work .

 

[talmy]

Short answer -- "No you can't"

Those adapters are to give Wifi capabilities to computers, not peripherals. And a drive connected via WiFi would have to appear as a NAS or other computer -- a simple adapter wouldn't do.

 

[mrbash]

I've got a 1TB hard drive which I've set up to be my time machine backup, which is great and it's working fine. However, I really wanted a wireless one but just couldn't afford it. Now I had a bit of a moment and thought "if I bought a wifi USB adapter could I do it wirelessly?"...

Well... could I? Simply plug in the USB adapter onto the hard drive and use the Wi-Fi built into my Macbook Pro (late 2010 model) and then have my time machine backups done wirelessly? I've read on google that this might not be possible, but unless I'm being dumb I don't see any issues? It would be really handy as I spend most of my time on the couch not at a desk so having the HDD attached is a bit of a nuisance.

Any help on this would be appreciated!

Regards,
Tim

Short answer is 'NO'.

The long answer is that your external device would require a USB host controller chip, which it most likely lacks. USB is not a peer-to-peer architecture. It is a host-client architecture. This means you cannot attach a client device (Ethernet adapter) to another client. Clients only attach to a single Host. Similarly, Hosts only attach to multiple Clients, but never to another Host.

 

[Tim3822]

Ok . Any way that I could make it wireless? Would be really handy!

Thanks for the replies anyhow .

 

[Phil A.]

Ok . Any way that I could make it wireless? Would be really handy!

Thanks for the replies anyhow .

The cheapest way would be to get a Wireless NAS enclosure and put your drive in it. Alternatively, some wireless routers allow you to plug a USB drive into them and they'll make it available wirelessly (for example the Airport Extreme base station does, and so does the BT Home Hub in the UK)
Having said that, OS X only supports wireless backup to Time Capsules, not NAS boxes (and not even drives plugged into an Airport Extreme base station). You can force it to backup to them, but I wouldn't want to use an unsupported method to do my backups...

 

[Tim3822]

Ok, do the time capsules still have that habit of dying after 18 months or so? Seems strange that you can't do it to what you suggested. I guess I'll just have to make do with what I have!