Replacing old Time Capsule

Unfortunately, the Time Capsule.......which was a router and hard drive in one single package.......was unique. No other manufacturer offered a similar product, so if you are looking for an exact replacement, the only thing to consider is another Time Capsule.

Although the Time Capsule was discontinued by Apple more than2 years ago, you can still find them as new, refurbished and used on Ebay. Amazon offers refurbished products from time to time as well. Unfortunately, even if can find a new Time Capsule for sale though, the product was designed prior to 2013 so the Time Capsule is not exactly up to date technology wise.

if you read the information in the replies above, then you already know that the closest that you can come to a Time Capsule in a new up to date product is either a Synology router or one of the upper end Asus routers. These products provide a USB port on the router to which you can connect a USB drive and back up over the network using Time Machine.

So, instead of a one piece solution, this would be a two piece solution. There may be a few other routers that allow this, but I am not aware of any others that support Time Machine.

If you already have another router, then a NAS that will support Time Machine backups would be the way to go. Synology is by far the most favorite NAS on the support forums, so that would be the place to look if the budget allows.

I was hoping to find something inexpensive, works wirelessly and wouldn't die in the near future.

IF budget is the main factor.. buy a cheap USB drive.. plug it directly into the laptop and use it for Time Machine (or better still, Carbon Copy Cloner) backups.. at least for the time being.

I use a 4TB desktop USB drive, partitioned into two equal parts.. use the main partition for CCC bootable clone and the second partition for Time Machine. That is in addition to all the network stuff which I do for test and support purposes now rather than concern about having backups. I know it is harder with laptop.. but if you have one of the recent models then I would consider buying a USB -C charging hub.. which you need to plug in anyway.. and have the USB drive hanging off that.

You kill the two birds.. since you still need to plug in charger and having the disk available makes it doubly useful.

Plenty of such beasts available on OWC website.

Big Sur the next Mac OS version may go somewhere else with this.. so in terms of best, fastest cheapest and most reliable skip your wifi / network requirement for now.. in the future you can always use the same USB drive plugged into a router if things work out that way.

I'm also likely going to move to a newer cable modem (for cable internet) that includes a WiFi router (latest revisions).

Before you do that, it might be a good idea to check and see if the modem/router or gateway includes a USB port......to which you could connect a USB drive and back up that way. You would need to make sure that the modem/router USB port supports Time Machine backups though. Very few do.

If the modem/router or gateway does not support Time Machine to an attached USB drive, then you might want to get a simple modem and add the Synology or one of the upper end Asus routers.......which will support Time Machine backups to a USB drive.

I'm moving to the Synology in a month or two for just this reason. My Time Capsule is aging and it won't go much longer. So, I need a new router and a way to back up over a network without going into the expensive NAS product category.

It is remarkable that your 500 GB Time Capsule will still operate.......amazingly good luck!

Does the router have to be connected to the router that Comcast provides as part of my internet service?

Yes, that is the way you would do it.

What we generally suggest is to buy your own modem only.. and run the synology as the only router..

Then you don't end up with multiple routers.

However the standard ISP supplied routers are cheap and often bottom of the barrel products designed more the convenience of the ISP than end user. i.e. they control your router remotely and so can easily test and see if things go bad.

They certainly will NEVER include things like Apple specific backup.. and likely includes no USB drive functionality at all.

Effectively you are buy a Router plus a USB drive because it is cheaper than buying a NAS.

If you can use that router for its true purpose then you have a good deal.. two birds taken out with one stone.. i.e. main network router and Time Machine network backups.

However if you already use an ISP router you do not wish to replace.. a cheap NAS is far superior. Easier to configure, more useful for lots of things.. video and audio streaming, photo storage, surveillance, file server, as well as backup across all devices in your network. It costs more than the router + USB combo but not by enough to warrant elimination from your list of replacements unless cost is huge factor and you cannot stretch the budget.

For what its worth, I have used Lacie drives for 15+ years with flawless results, but there are a number of other good products out there.

I am having to more than likely replace my Time Capsule as well. I started having problems after upgrading to Catalina 10.15.6 . That's a whole different story that I'm also following. As the tech was working on getting my files to migrate after reimaging my MacBook Pro, the Time Capsule was just not finishing up a Time Machine migration of the last back up. So, I found out that Apple discontinued making the Time Capsule and now I too have to find a replacement. I was hoping to find something inexpensive, works wirelessly and wouldn't die in the near future. I've always been one to do my research before investing in major purchases that need to last for a good length of time. So, what brands are suggested? I'm generally pretty savvy, but I am not in anyway a guru on understanding what I should be looking for to do the same job the Time Capsule did. Thank you!

Thank you for your input. Some of the info was Greek to me but I take it that I would need an external hard drive and another router to accomplish the thing a Time Capsule would have done in one piece. Does the router have to be connected to the router that Comcast provides as part of my internet service? I’m going to be the one to have to set all of this up so I want to understand and not have leftover useless pieces as sometimes can be the case when putting things together. Thanks!

Thank you. I will follow up on the two suggested. I had read about Synology and did see something from ASUS at MicroCenter.

https://www.synology.com/en-us/products/RT2600ac

https://www.asus.com/support/FAQ/1011283/

Thanks for the explanation. This makes sense! Budget is a big factor right now, so the two pieces will do for now. Have a great weekend!

In the imperfect world there is no perfect solution sadly!

Consider this mind wanderings from old guy who spent far too much time answering questions about Time Capsules and Time Machine.

I had read about Synology and did see something from ASUS at MicroCenter.

Going back to Tricker's post since it is his thread.

I don't consider a drive attached to a Mac thunderbolt port a viable solution

I'm also trying to keep it simple and "inexpensive"

I have both Synology router and Asus router and have tested Time Machine to both. (Note somewhat outdated but at least decent testing over longer period than any "REVIEW" which lasts a week)

Synology works very well. As far as backup is concerned I would put it tops in the router stakes.

I do have misgivings in Synology is a very bit player in Router space and they have built a grand total of 3 router models. The first one was not a success. The two current ones are getting older and no replacements have been announced. Note if you can pickup cheap second hand Synology RT1900AC they actually work fine for Time Machine backup. Wireless was poor so it is not a viable package for all in almost one replacement. However Synology keep the firmware up to date and it will work fine as a cheap Time Machine Network target.

Asus is excellent router.. IMHO the best of the domestic routers with continually updated firmware. It is far from flawless though, and concerning that Asus have not updated SMB protocol. You still need to turn on SMB1 for it to work. This is really a concern as that should have been deprecated long ago as both MS and Apple recognise it as source of malware (ransomware. )

I hit issues with Time Machine backups to the Asus which failed on a 2month cycle.. this is long before Catalina.. and I kept testing over a year.. with the end result I cannot recommend it at least in combo with Time Machine.

I do use Asus RT-AC88U now as main router and it works great in that role. I have restarted testing recently using Carbon Copy Cloner to USB drive. CCC is far more reliable cf TM. So far it has run only a couple of weeks.. so I consider that insufficient time for reliability testing. It is going well.

A number of other router manufacturers do include Time Machine compatibility. I saw very recent cheap TP-Link Archer C2300 has Time Machine extensions available. Netgear have long dabbled with it as have a number of others. The results are far from great even in reviews.. that is without long term testing. Frankly if Time Machine is a major factor in a router purchase I don't think anything but Synology RT2600AC (or old 1900AC) should be on anyones list.

Honestly, a cheap NAS, Synology make one and two disk introductory models, should be high on your list.

It is going to outlast any router.

It is built for the job.

It is much faster over the network.

It has easily accessible drives which can be upgraded, replaced and setup in raid to hold data even in event of disk failure.

Synology has superior firmware upgrade cycle. When Apple make their inevitable changes which break things.. as per Catalina and the current Time Capsule.. Synology will update firmware in timely way.

I also run Synology (almost) NAS. IMHO it is far superior in every way to using a router.

Given that routers often have a far more limited lifespan than you are used to with Apple Time Capsule.. (10 years is miraculous though).. you are going to be stuck when buying another router because the existing USB drive may well not work in current configuration and need wipe and restart backup.