Will Apple ever upgrade the Time Capsule/AirPort? (1 Viewer)

[DaveF]

Well, considering there isn't a single good third party equivalent to a Time Capsule, I'll go and buy one while they still exist. Sad day.

Another perspective:
"Alternatives to AirPort - Six Colors" (https://sixcolors.com/post/2018/04/alternatives-to-airport/)
What about the Time Capsule? When it launched, it was the definitive way to back up your Macs without plugging in an external hard drive. Very convenient, especially if your primary device is a MacBook! Here’s what I’d say: You’re better off backing up remotely to a cloud-based service like Backblaze, which is The Wirecutter’s pick. A Time Machine backup has the advantage of being fast and on your local network, but if something catastrophic happens to your home or office, you will lose your backup. Backing up to the cloud keeps your data regardless of natural disasters, and has other advantages including being able to retrieve any backed up file from anywhere.

That said, if you want a local backup server, your best option is to buy a NAS, short for network-attached storage. These are essentially giant hard drives with small embedded computers that act as servers when you put them on your local network. Wirecutter has a nice NAS roundup, and you’ll find that many NAS devices support Time Machine. Ideally, a NAS will also be able to back itself up to the cloud.

 

[Ted Todorov]

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That said, if you want a local backup server, your best option is to buy a NAS, short for network-attached storage. These are essentially giant hard drives with small embedded computers that act as servers when you put them on your local network. Wirecutter has a nice NAS roundup, and you’ll find that many NAS devices support Time Machine. Ideally, a NAS will also be able to back itself up to the cloud.

As someone who started out the Intel CPU Mac era with a Mac Mini and a Drobo, only to end up with an unrecoverable Drobo failure, no help from their website/company I ended up buying a 2009 MacPro and declared I was a never againgoing to be a NAS person. A decade later, that MacPro is still going strong and I've never had another equivalent failure as I did with the Drobo/Mini. (FWIW I got a 2012 Mac Mini as a “backup”, but it failed 4~5 years later due to the GPU dying and hasn’t been replaced since as there hasn’t been a new Mini out in almost 4 years).

Bottom line, hoping my new Time Capsule will last for almost a decade, and it will at least allow me to try to fix the fan of the old one, so 2 of them will last full decade. By 2028, thing should be different enough we won’t care, right?

 

[Ted Todorov]

So I got my “new” Time Capsule and AirPort Express. For now they are both staying in their boxes for future help. I seem to have fixed the fan failure on my existing Time Capsule by blowing compressed air through the fan opening.

Clearly lots of people seem to be following my lead in getting their last chance AirPorts: the UWS Apple Store had a big pile of AirPort Extremes on the shelf on Friday when I checked for a Time Capsule. All Exteremes were gone by Monday when I picked up my TimeCapsule order and bought an Express.

 

[DaveF]

iMore on options for getting on without an AirPort or TimeCapsule.
https://www.imore.com/how-keep-using-time-machine-when-airport-time-capsule-discontinued

 

[Ted Todorov]

Great, great news:

Apple just updated the AirPort Express firmware and it now has full AirPlay 2 support!!! TOSLink and decade old receivers and ancient but spectacularly good speakers are not dead yet!

Thank you, Apple!

https://www.macrumors.com/2018/08/28/airport-express-firmware-airplay-2/

Time to take my new Express out of the box (I am still running a truly ancient one (from the early 2000s?), that will now be retired)

 

[JohnRice]

Whadayaknow. Not sure I have any need for it, but just ran the update all the same.

 

[Ted Todorov]

So yes, everything works! You can even add the AirPort Express to your Home app

 

[DaveF]

Resurrecting the thread for a PSA

Michael Tsai - Blog - Time Capsule Thermal Flaw

Does your Mac still back up to an Apple Time Capsule? If so, it’s time to replace it, or at the very least its hard disk. The last model, the 802.11ac numbered A1470, is now more than three years old, and the risks of its hard disk failing are climbing every day. All older models, manufactured before 2013, are now running on borrowed time, as they’ve turned eight at least.