Time Capsule shuts down when USB HDD plugged in

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Time Capsule shuts down when USB HDD plugged in

Hooking up a Seagate 3TB external hard drive via USB 2.0 causes the 3rd gen, 1TB, Time Capsule to stop broadcasting its wifi signal and the indicator LED switches to solid amber (my TC functions in bridge mode, behind a router). The external hard drive uses its own power source and functions flawlessly over Firewire 800 or USB 2.0 with other Macs. It's been formatted into Mac OS Extended (Journaled). After disconnecting the Seagate external, the Time Capsule returns to normal functionality within a few minutes.

Using Airport Utility 6.1, I ensured the Time Capsule firmware was up to date (7.6.1) and file/secure disk sharing was enabled.

I tested the Time Capsule with a five year old Western Digital My Book external and had no issues accessing it over the network.

Is there some arbitrary limit in place to prevent Time Capsules from interfacing with devices over a certain size?

MacBook Pro, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.1), 2.2GHz i7, 8GB DDR3

Posted on Sep 1, 2012 5:29 PM

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Answer 1

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LaPastenague

Level 9

67,226 points

Sep 1, 2012 8:20 PM in response to Pretendo

It should handle the 3TB size although cannot say I have tried it...

But the internal USB port is so low powered you might still need a powered hub.. even though the drive is powered .. it is still demanding too much current and that is causing the TC to stop working.. a solid amber is showing that the TC has failed to complete boot.. or has crashed.

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