Airport and Time Capsule Hardware Upgrade Suggestions

recs for a mesh system with TC capability for an old concrete walled metropolitan apartment in LA with a bunch of neighbors and outside wireless noise, that I can still get Time Capsule capability to work on?

First of all.. that is a difficult place to get any sort of wifi, even mesh to work in.

Second no mesh system has Time Machine capability. So that is going to need to be add on.

Is there any ethernet in the apartment? Is it possible to add?

I will assume the answer is no to both those questions.. but let me recommend you do think long and hard about running some ethernet. Depending on size and layout, it can be exceedingly difficult to get good speed through those solid walls. Even if it is just from one end to the other. What other cabling might already exist? e.g. phone or TV cable.

I need to ask what sort of internet / broadband you have?

Do you have a modem router supplied by ISP? If so make and model number.

What speed are you getting from it??

A relatively slow speed on your internet and no need for fast local lan .. exceeding 100Mbps say makes life easier. The faster you need things to run the more you need to spend.

I'd like a mesh network system, with time capsule capability networked like it is in my Apple ecosystem. This is to allow all the idevices, MBPs, iMacs, etc to backup.

idevices do not backup to a Time Capsule. Apple designed them to use either iCloud or local Mac. You can deliberately copy files to some local network storage.. but that is different to a backup.

The easiest solution to the backup problem of your Macs is to use a local hard disk. This is easy for iMac... simply plug a USB into the port at the back. For latest OS it is far superior method anyway. A laptop is more difficult as it makes backup dependent on remembering to plug in the hard disk. Let me therefore suggest a solution like ordering a charging hub with extra USB ports.. so every time you plug the laptop into charge it is then automatically connected to external USB drive and can backup.

Once you have this setup then idevices can backup to Mac in local network which will subsequently backup to local disk. Thus and so did Apple build it.

To do network backup there are two solutions..

Plug a USB drive into a main router which is NOT part of the mesh.

A good example is Synology router, RT2600AC.

The Orbi is still one of the best mesh solutions.. but it does not require taking the router role.. be careful as some mesh system MUST have main router as part of the mesh.

OR plug a network capable backup device.. i.e. your existing Time Capsule into the main router by ethernet even if it is part of the mesh.. this is meantime solution since Time Capsule will not last forever and Apple don't make them no more.. you need to get alternative and so far the best is Synology NAS. These can be small one or two bay units.. bottom of the range is fine.

Here is your tossup. A proper NAS has much better speed and functionality. The router as per my suggestion of the Synology is cheaper all up but is already getting a few years old and Synology have given no indication of AX wifi products. It could be a dead duck.

In terms of configuration of the router or the NAS to handle backup they are equal.. since the firmware in both is pretty much the same anyway.

Note .. I use Synology NAS.. it is not at all difficult to setup if you follow the tutorial. Lots of people are using them and find it is better than Apple Time Capsule for reliability with Catalina in particular since it uses SMB3. Apple never updated the TC to the latest network protocols. I would not expect them to do so now since it would require a major rewrite of the OS. In general routers are unsuited to Time Machine since it now requires SMB3 (AFP works but poor reliability). SMB3 is very resource demanding and requires dedicated devices like NAS which can be built with sufficient speed and memory to handle it. Routers for most part use the already deprecated SMB1 or AFP.

the Asus ZenWiFi AC (CT8) looks to be a good candidate simply because it has USB 3 inputs

I spent a bit of time looking for info on this one.. it does not yet support Time Machine.

Some Asus routers do .. e.g. my current AC88U and some of the earlier and even the AX models.. but mesh seems less likely.

As a further comment my testing of Time Machine on Asus makes me less than 100% enthusiastic about it's reliability. Asus still use SMB1 as most routers do although the CT8 seems to have gone backwards in terms of security and is making FTP available.

It might be about the only mesh which even supports a hard disk but that does not make it suitable for time machine in any way shape or form.

As more general comment I recommend Carbon Copy Cloner or the like for backup to network in Catalina and even earlier Mac OS unless you want the dreaded Time Machine needs to clean out the backup and start over.

Most third party backup solutions are going to work better with CCC than TM by about 6000%

I have 2 extreme and 2 express, they still work fine but the range is not super for my current requirements.

when I have to pay the expense of upgrading it, I will be looking at synology as I have two NAS's from them and like them, read good things about their routers and mesh, but currently they do not seem to support 820.11.ax so I would not pay that kind of expense until they had a model which did.

I figured it was time to let TC go. 

You can stretch out its usefulness.. a bit.. if it is 5+ years old it is time to replace NOW.. so no need to even quibble.. it has given you excellent service to pay itself off.

If it is 3-5years.. and catalina is having trouble.. you can stretch out lifespan by using Carbon Copy Cloner (CCC) or equivalent. TM is too unreliable.

I keep thinking it would be possible to get a Gen4 which is the best of them IMHO and put an 8TB drive in it and still get useful lifespan out of it but the issue is Apple is moving away from AFP protocol.. to SMB. And that means special SMB3 which is unsupported by TC and vast majority of alternative routers etc.

If it is even younger.. then sell it on eBay and let someone else use it for whatever purpose.. perhaps older Macs that are still happy with AFP networking.

Second is make a choice with something like a hybrid mesh with Synology RT2600ac with the MR2200ac if it’s needed. And if i want a NAS I can just add it there for all devices to use. Could I also just use 2 MR2200s?

Hybrid mesh is a temptation.. resistance.. is.. not.. futile.. Don't go there.

In your situation .. mesh must be tri-band.. i.e. a separate backhaul channel. That is what gives the Orbi and the more expensive mesh their edge. Synology and standard Asus AiMesh do not use separate backhaul.. same with the cheaper mesh like google nest (WiFi) etc.. so it is only slightly better than the existing Apple system..

So answer is YES but it will not work anywhere near as well as built from ground up mesh.. UNLESS you have ethernet backhaul.. that changes the scenario dramatically. Since you have put that out of realm of possible.. stick with ground up mesh.. with Orbi top of that list.

And .. a router like the synology could be used.. but the NAS is far superior option long term.

cloud backups for the MBPs

User files yes.. system files no.. but you can easily create a bootable backup on USB drive.. as long as you continuously backup your user files. Apple may institute some full system backup in the future.. and I do realise some cloud services allow full backup.. but on 20Mbps upload speed not so great to use.. IMHO.

Obviously there are many ways to approach the problem.. in a Netgear Orbi setup and you are happy with the Time Capsule for a few more years.. then you can plug it into the satellite closest to where you connect and with a bit of setup magic which we can go into will work fine (with CCC) for a couple more years.. and by then hopefully Apple will have moved forward on whatever solution they see long term.. or we clearly see there is none on offer.