Using TC as an external hard drive

Don't bother about reading the files on windows.. go back to your Mac and see if the files are showing.

Check the permissions on Data again and you should have read and write permissions for everyone.

I doubt Apple can help you. But yes.. buy the External USB drive.. plug it into the computer and make sure it is HFS+ formatted.. it is easier if you just buy a mac format drive.. but no problem and usually cheaper to buy standard windows NTFS drive.. and format it yourself HFS+ (Mac OS extended Journaled).

Plug it into the TC and then archive the TC. Disk tab and click archive.

It will take around a day to backup 1.5TB so once you start it is going to take a while but it will work away on its own without your help.

Once completed you can then plug it directly into the computer and then you can manipulate permissions properly.

Did this happen when you "upgraded" to Mojave? The problem is permissions. Actually as a person from the windows world you will have never seen this issue but it is a major one with other operating systems.

In other words I am hoping your files are still all on the TC but you have simply lost the rights to them.

Have you installed any other software?

For example an Anti-Virus software for the Mac can have major issues with network drives.

Try and think of anything you have added just before the problem started?

When you open the TC in say Time Machine or Airport Utility how much free space does it have? Is that what you would expect in terms of your files?

One thing I would do immediately.. archive your TC. So before you start messing around.. plug a Mac formatted hard disk into USB port of the TC.. go to the airport utility in the Mac and click on the TC icon.. click on edit and go to the disk tab.. use archive to make a backup of all the files on the TC.

The disk needs to be >all the files used by TC.. so if you have filled 1.5TB of the 3TB you need 2TB drive at a min.. but it is really better to get the same size.. so a 3TB or larger. Once you have all the files on the USB drive we might be able to fix the permissions issue.. or whatever the issue on either the TC directly or the backup.

I do not keep a copy of the lost folders on the local drive.

Not sure that I understand this. Are you saying that you moved folders on your Mac to the Time Capsule drive.....and.....you then deleted the folders from your Mac?

If you did this, then you have no backup.....since you must have at least two copies of important files on two separate hard drives to have a backup. Then, if one drive has a problem, you still have the "other" copy of the files on the other drive.

Where are the back ups from the TC kept

If you are asking about backups made using Time Machine, all of the backups are stored in a special file on the Mac called a sparsebundle. The sparsebundle will have the name of your Mac as the name of the special file.

But.....you don't access your backups this way.....you access backups using Time Machine by opening the Time Machine application on your Mac and going back in the time to find the files that you need. Then, you can "restore" the files that you choose.

But.....if you deleted files or folders from your Mac.....then those files or folders would not be backed up, since there was nothing to back up.

and can I use these to back up the TC

Again, I'm not sure what you are asking here. The TC cannot back itself up.....It does not back up the files that are already on the TC.

If you could clarify things for us, we might be able to suggest how best to approach your issue.

At the moment I hate Apple

Sure.. we understand.

Sometimes it is not a question of love.. it is a question of hate least...!!

Your method of using the TC was always going to be problematic.. Apple does not support using the TC this way.. so the issue you have is lack of experience.. some things are important to ask before you use them. Apple intend you to use iCloud the way you wanted to the use the TC.. but of course it isn't quite that simple.

Anyway I have a fix for you.. which is easy peasy.

You will need to use a windows computer. Do you still have one? Or can at least borrow one.

Download and install airport utilities for windows 5.6.1

Download AirPort Utility 5.6.1 for Windows

Now I am using the Mac version of the same utility so it functions exactly the same but will look slightly different.

Click on Manual Setup. ^^^^^^^^^^

Continue.. ie ignore the warning message. Allow any other access that is needed.

Go to the Disks tab.. File Sharing.

You are going to turn on Guest access.

You can now apply the change.. and voila.. your TC is totally transformed to allow everyone access to everything.. which maybe not such a great idea in the long run but will fix the immediate issue.

NOTE.. my easy peasy solution will likely not work with latest incarnation of win10.. aka winX.

You need SMB1 protocol which MS removed as a security precaution so you will need to reinstall it.

NOTE.. as per earlier comments from Bob.. your current practice allows no backups of your files. A TC was designed as a target for Time Machine.. not a source.

You should not keep using the TC for your normal files.. Apple is very specific about this in some applications like iphotos and by extension photos.. you will eventually corrupt the entire library doing it. You MUST use your local hard disk.. either internal or a disk plugged in by USB / Thunderbolt.

If your using the laptop, I recommend you buy a dock with whatever Thunderbolt port your laptop has.. and hang a large USB drive off the dock.. but there are other ways and means..

Then setup Time Machine to include those external disks in your backup to the TC.

Is there any point backing up the 1.4TB as there is nothing there

Something is there.. And yes it is worth backing it up.. because once you plug that disk into the Mac directly you then have control over file permissions you do not have on the TC as a network share. I cannot promise you that your files will come back intact.. but if they were erased the disk space would be recovered.. so something is there.

I would have hoped you could directly access them after you opened the permissions using the windows tool.. that is my experience from High Sierra.. I have not tested with Mojave.. so cannot really say.

When you say plug the external drive into the TC, can I then use this permanenetly (the external drive) for general storage of files/documents and folders? Can I set it up so the TC backs up the external drive as well? You must be so sick of me... sorry!

The USB drive can be permanently connected to the TC. I do not recommend you use it that way.

You still do not want to keep active files on network drives. So if you want to add storage to your Mac.. it is much better to plug the USB into the Mac directly.

There are two other problems.. not all USB drives work reliably.. you will often find drives spin down and will disappear completely. They will not spin up again until you disconnect and reconnect the drive.

And the USB port on the TC is 2.0 standard.. ie slow.. not just a bit slow.. over the network we are talking extremely slow.

The second part of your question seems to assume the TC has brains.. it has none. It is a dumb as a board hard disk in a wireless router. The backup software in your computer does all the brains work.. but Time Machine cannot backup a network source to a network target. It can only backup local sources to either local or network targets.

You can certainly buy a better backup software.. We do recommend Carbon Copy Cloner which can indeed backup from USB plugged into the TC to the TC.. but this is super slow.. because all files are passed through the computer.. so it goes back and forth over the network.. and for wireless this is hopeless.. not so bad by ethernet.. but it is 10x quicker to plug the USB into the computer.. where you have USB3 ports.. and copy files in one direction.. over network to the TC.. not in both directions.

Just to add to what Bob posted.. we need precise details of how you moved these folders.

Did you simply copy and paste them from the Mac to the TC root directory.. or did it drop inside a sparsebundle Time Machine backup which would be really bad news??

Did you do the folder moving while using High Sierra for example and then upgraded to Mojave? Are you trying to find the folders from a different computer or what if anything has changed? eg even user in the Mac MUST be the same as you had when you copied the files.

why would the TC 'pack up' like that.

I don't think that it has, but Mojave has some real issues with file permissions. It may take a guru who is familiar with Terminal commands to get at the "lost" files on the TC.

LaPastenague knows more about Terminal than I do, so stay tuned.

Please heed his advice to back up everything that is on the TC drive to another drive......before.....you attempt do anything else.

I have not moved these 'files', I have always kept them on the TC as an external storage.

But unfortunately, it still sounds as if the files on the TC were the only copy of the files that you had.....and you did not have another copy of the files on another hard drive. As I think you now understand, you should only do this with files that you can afford to lose......since users always seem to lose important files for which they have no backup. Sorry for the lecture, but we see users losing important data like this every day.

When I have created a 'file' I have 'saved' them to the TC

Can you provide a few more details on "how" you did this? The TC drive is named "Data" by default.....(unless you have changed the name of the drive). Did you save the files directly to "Data"?......or.....did you save the files to another folder that was on "Data"?

It sounds like you were also using the TC to store backups of your Mac made using Time Machine. Hopefully, you did not "save" the other files to the same folder or file that also stored the Time Machine backups.

I tried your 'procedures' as 'above' and it did not work - but then again I was not sure how to view the files on a 'Windows Computer - uggghhhh'.

Did not work how? What error message did you get?

You cannot view the files easily on a PC.. the trick is to open permissions so you can see the files on your Mac.. not the PC.

Your screenshot is not much help.. it does certainly not show anything much in the files though.

But you can check the size of the sparsebundle.. select it in finder and get info..

Then

Please check actual free space via the airport utility.

Figure out how much space your files are using.

I only have a 16GB USB, that is the largest I have for the back up.

If you want to get your files back.. buy a 3TB USB external hard drive.. or bigger.. they are not that expensive.. and if your files are worth anything to you.. the cost is minimal.

Much much better screenshots.. thanks.

I have very strong hopes your files are all there..

Since about half the disk is used. They should be fine.

I am sure your fix of the permissions from windows failed.. because if it succeeded you would see full permissions for everyone.

If you are still going ahead without preserving your files on a USB.. (I won't reiterate my view on messing up your files without backup).. then yes.. just apply the change of permissions. It will hopefully work but I doubt it will do anything.. the disk in the TC is NOT controlled by your computer.. It is a network share.. all permissions are controlled by the TC.. and so you can do all the permission changes you like.. nothing will happen..!!

It is unlikely to do anything bad.. so give it a try.. don't be surprised if absolutely nothing happens.

The whole reason I gave you the windows method is that changing permissions on the TC can only be done in the way I showed you. I would have another try using windows airport utility.

I ran out of edit time.. because there is one more thing that is important.

NOTE.. I still recommend the backup (archive i explained earlier) to USB before you do anything else.. you have zero backups. However this is the least risky approach. So if you are stuck then I would not be over worried about this having bad results. Unforeseen things happen.. but I tested this approach on my own files.. and got another guru in the forum here to test this .. neither of us had any issues accessing our files afterwards. YMMV.