Slow USB transfer to Time Capsule

Question

Slow USB transfer to Time Capsule

I recently purchased a Time Capsule and have decided in addition to its Time Machine back-up duties to use it to store my iTunes Media, which I had previously had on an external USB HDD (and then use the external USB to back-up Media drive through a folder-syncing app, since Time Machine won't recognise a networked drive). I've connected the USB drive to the TC, and attempted to drag and drop the iTunes Media folder from the external USB to to TC HD.

The estimated time for completion was 7 days for 300GB of data.

Any suggestions as to what is going wrong? Please tell me that the TC isn't sending the data over wireless from the USB disk to my MacBook Pro in order to then send it back over wireless to the TC to write it to that disk! So far the TC isn't looking like a great investment - Time Machine takes so long to back up (spending 10 - 15 minutes preparing the backup and then another 10-15 minutes to write 20 - 30MB of data) that I've turned it off, because the process makes watching my iTunes content jerky. And with this data transfer problem, I'm almost ready to give up.

I'm working with a 2TB Time Capsule, 15" ealry 2011 MacBook Pro (8GB RAM, 250GB SSD), OS X Lion and a 1TB USB HDD

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7)

Posted on Aug 5, 2011 2:45 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

LaPastenague

Level 9

67,208 points

Aug 5, 2011 5:12 PM in response to aussieguyinnyc

Please tell me that the TC isn't sending the data over wireless from the USB disk to my MacBook Pro in order to then send it back over wireless to the TC to write it to that disk!

Exactly what is happening.. sorry about that chief!! (Maxwell Smart voice).

Unfortunately if you have the external drive connected to the TC and want to write the data to the TC that is what happens.. there is no way it can directly copy since the copy is running from the laptop.

Much better to plug the external drive straight into the laptop.. and plug the laptop into the TC by ethernet cable and do the copy in one shot.. then you can do other backups (your normal incremental time machine) by wireless.

Alway try and eliminate double hop wireless.. it is incredibly slow due to having single channel half duplex operation.

Even if you have to use a separate device to do it.. the speed will be much better.

And it is better to use a usb plugged into the TC just as a backup of the TC.. use the TC itself to store your itunes rather than a drive hanging off it.

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Answer 2

Aug 5, 2011 6:00 PM in response to LaPastenague

Well I guess Control had their shoe-phone and Apple has the iPhone, likewise Control created the Cone of Silence and Apple created the Time Capsule. I wouldn't be surprised if the two companies used the same guy to engineer their communications workflow for the latter products.

I'm reading conflicting things about whether to use the USB disk as the primary iTunes store and backup to TC, or use TC for iTunes Media and Time Machine backups and backup to the USB. It would seem that iTunes would slow down as the TC slowly filled with TM backups, and it would make sense to have all my backups not mixed in with my "originals" but then again I would hate to think how slow downloading from the iTunes Store will be if the USB drive is my main storage point. Thoughts? Solutions?

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