Q: Time Machine, external USB Drive and Airport Express...
Completely confused. Why does this page say "Time Machine is not supported" when http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5924 states "OS X Time Machine supports compatible USB disks connected to ... AirPort Extreme? Even page 9 of the Extreme's Setup Guide states "Use the Time Machine application in OS X v 10.5.7 or later to back up all the Mac computers in your home." With directions on page 13... And YES, the guys at the Apple Store said that this will work! So what's the truth?
Apparently it will work, as long as you start a NEW back-up - you can't use a drive that you have been directly hooking up to your Macs:
http://pondini.org/TM/AEQ2.html
(Had a Time Capsule, until the power supply went poof... Rescued the drive from it and put it in an external USB case. Can connect it directly to my MacBook Pro and Time Machine works fine, updating the existing backups for three different machines. But when connected to a brand-new Airport Extreme (even after updating the "Select Disk" Control Preference setting) it fails with an "insufficient space" error...)
What's the difference between a drive in a Time Capsule and the exact same drive hooked up to an Airport Extreme?
Posted on Feb 17, 2014 11:03 PM