can I use my Time Capsule USB to connect to my macBook directly?

Question

Level 1

8 points

can I use my Time Capsule USB to connect to my macBook directly?

I was told at the store I would be able to. but I bought a USB cable and it's not able to see the time capsule drive. The idea is to be able to access my work files remotely around the house or through USB or cable when I'm working on big heavy files. Is this possible?

I have connected though ethernet but that's slow and unstable. when I transfer large 100GB files it chokes up.

what to do?

thanks fo your help!

time capsule-OTHER, Mac OS X (10.6.8)

Posted on Oct 12, 2012 4:40 PM

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Answer 1

Oct 12, 2012 5:02 PM in response to thedonat

The store.. are salesmen.. their job is to sell.. not tell the truth.. if you ask a question to which you expect the answer yes.. guess what answer they give.

It is not possible to connect a TC to Mac via USB.. it is not an external drive.. it is a network drive. You must use wireless or ethernet.

I have connected though ethernet but that's slow and unstable. when I transfer large 100GB files it chokes up.

what to do?

thanks fo your help!

Gigabit ethernet is 2x the speed of USB 2.0 so there is something very wrong with your network.. remove any old fast ethernet so everything is gigabit.

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Answer 2

thedonat Author

Level 1

8 points

Oct 12, 2012 5:22 PM in response to LaPastenague

Thanks for your help LaPastenague 🙂

Yes, when I posed my problem, this was their solution so it wasn't really a "yes" sorta thing.

Never the less I would hope they would acknowledge if they don't know.

anyway so thanks . Its good to know so I can stop trying.

the ethernet cable in new so should be good.

do you know if there is a way to see the actual transfer rate I'm getting??

and then on a side note is there a stability difference between USB and ethernet?

thank you!!

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Answer 3

Oct 12, 2012 5:38 PM in response to thedonat

Are you actually on Snow Leopard as your profile indicates?

USB and ethernet stability should be the same.. but Lion and Mountain Lion have networking ability of wet string.

Unfortunately your TC being a new one cannot go back to 7.5.2 firmware which is also better.

Open activity monitor from utilities to see your actual network speeds.

Plug the TC directly into the computer.. transfer a file ( a very large one so you are not measuring file table write speeds).. and see what you get. You should easily manage what I suggested.. 50MBytes/sec although it will depend if the computer is old then the hard disk in the computer could be limitation.

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Answer 4

thedonat Author

Level 1

8 points

Oct 12, 2012 6:04 PM in response to LaPastenague

Yes snow Leopard. the wet string is sarcasm meaing it's bad right. just incase it's the name of some fast new thing 🙂

so your suggestion would be to not upgrade?

I have a 2008 macBook aluminum

ok will do that!! thanks again

appreciate it

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Answer 5

Oct 12, 2012 6:19 PM in response to thedonat

the wet string is sarcasm meaing it's bad right. 🙂

Yes.. wet string being slightly better than dry string which has no conductivity at all.

so your suggestion would be to not upgrade?

I have a 2008 macBook aluminum

ok will do that!! thanks again

appreciate it

You can upgrade.. but be ready to downgrade again.. ie take a disk image.. not a TM backup.. a disk image using superduper can restore a working laptop in an hour or two.. exactly as it was. TM is great for incremental backup but it is rather messy for full restore.

Try it and see.. the long established engineering method.. experiment, try it out.. you will learn 200% more that way.

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Answer 6

thedonat Author

Level 1

8 points

Oct 15, 2012 8:48 AM in response to LaPastenague

Oh man I tried this and I'm only getting

/// Network

data received/ sec 30k

data sent/sec 170k

peaks 1200packets/sec

/// Disk activity

data read/ sec 3MB

data written/sec 2mb

peak: 22MB/sec

either way I'm way off 50MB/sec

you ave any ideas on how to correct that?

when you said it's should be 50mb/sec

is the network speed?

or disk activity?

I'm about to make a disk image because I think I need to move on to mountain lion
for a bunch of reasons but icloud is the main one

thank you

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Answer 7

Oct 15, 2012 1:09 PM in response to thedonat

Are you directly connected by ethernet.. with wireless turned off?

Copy a very large file .. just one to the TC and see what speed you get.

If you have really slow performance then sorry but something is wrong.. and locating where is difficult.

Plug in a USB and test with that.. you MUST compare.. so you can locate the issue.

If it is really slow with USB just like ethernet then the hdd is on the way out.. or corrupted.

Use disk utility to check the hard disk.

If USB is fast.. then just do a TM backup to the USB drive.. do your update and fix it after.

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