Backups in lieu of Airport Time Capsule

[Arranguez]

This sort of question has been asked before no doubt and I have searched but failed to find the answer I think I'm looking for.

We have a Time Capsule backup for the Apple stuff in the house which is hard wired to the router, but all the backups happen over WiFi. The macOS 27 update renders this option now obsolete so I need a separate system. But what do I get?

All previous searches seemed to talk about cloud backups and never WiFi. I'm just after an identical setup. albeit maybe with some mirrored redundancy. The backup volumes are not huge, no more than 2TB (and more than likely under 1).

[Ozone]

AI says you still can backup wirelessly using a couple of options:

Time Machine backups over Wi-Fi are not supported on macOS 27 because the protocol required for network sharing, Apple Filing Protocol (AFP), has been removed. Apple explicitly states that Time Machine backup destinations using AFP, such as AirPort Extreme Base Stations or Time Capsules, are no longer compatible with macOS 27 or later.

To perform a wireless backup on macOS 27, you must use a Network Attached Storage (NAS) device (such as Synology or Western Digital) that supports SMB protocol extensions for Time Machine. These devices connect to your router via Ethernet and broadcast their availability over Wi-Fi, allowing your Mac to back up automatically without physical cables. Alternatively, you can connect an external drive to a different Mac running macOS 11 or later and share it via File Sharing with the "Share as a Time Machine backup destination" option enabled, though this also relies on modern networking standards rather than AFP.

[Suspicious_user]

Ozone said:

AI says you still can backup wirelessly using a couple of options:

Time Machine backups over Wi-Fi are not supported on macOS 27 because the protocol required for network sharing, Apple Filing Protocol (AFP), has been removed. Apple explicitly states that Time Machine backup destinations using AFP, such as AirPort Extreme Base Stations or Time Capsules, are no longer compatible with macOS 27 or later.

To perform a wireless backup on macOS 27, you must use a Network Attached Storage (NAS) device (such as Synology or Western Digital) that supports SMB protocol extensions for Time Machine. These devices connect to your router via Ethernet and broadcast their availability over Wi-Fi, allowing your Mac to back up automatically without physical cables. Alternatively, you can connect an external drive to a different Mac running macOS 11 or later and share it via File Sharing with the "Share as a Time Machine backup destination" option enabled, though this also relies on modern networking standards rather than AFP.

They would need to invest in new hardware to do this. Honestly, this AI waffle boils my piss, "this relies on modern networking standards rather than AFP" - such a pointless statement if they have a network in their house they'll not be using AFP.

The OP can backup to an external drive or to a NAS - both cost money.

[Ozone]

This is normal procedure for Apple to get everybody to upgrade every few years to stay in the ecosystem.

The Airport Time Capsules were discontinued, I think, 8 years ago.

Windows for the long term win!

[Magic919]

You just need something that can present an SMB share. Can be an existing machine or some routers do this.

[Suspicious_user]

Ozone said:

The Airport Time Capsules were discontinued, I think, 8 years ago.

I can't remember, but I sold mine years ago, then used a Synology to as Time Machine destination, then a QNAP and now it's a Unifi NAS.

[therams]

Wouldn’t you be better off paying Apple £3 / £5 / £10 a month for an iCloud backup account? Can set up as family sharing if you have multiple users or machines

Depends on what you are backing up i guess. But if its mac/iphone/photos/keychain/documents then iCloud is very easy to set up

Obvs iCloud isn’t a business/enterprise style backup strategy. You;d need other things in place too, such as a NAS as suggested above

[Arranguez]

I'd like a physical storage backup as well as the cloud. I don't know why - call me someone born in 1977!

So if I pick a NAS drive (with the SMB connection/protocol) with two drives I can mirror them, connect to my router and backup through WiFi just by telling Time Machine about the new destination?

Of course, it won't look as nice as the subtle white object in the hall so that's one to prepare the arguments for with the missus!

[LunarOne]

therams said:

Wouldn t you be better off paying Apple £3 / £5 / £10 a month for an iCloud backup account? Can set up as family sharing if you have multiple users or machines

Depends on what you are backing up i guess. But if its mac/iphone/photos/keychain/documents then iCloud is very easy to set up

Obvs iCloud isn t a business/enterprise style backup strategy. You;d need other things in place too, such as a NAS as suggested above

iCloud is NOT backup. If you delete a file on your computer it is deleted from iCloud.

To the OP - I never had a Time Capsule but I do have a Synology NAS which behaves exactly like one. It advertises itself over the network as a Time Capsule. I'm not sure what it is in the latest OS that renders this impossible but it should work. Perhaps your time capsule only uses AFP which Apple has deprecated? Any newer one that uses SMB should still work.

You can get a 2-bay Synology with 2x2TB disks for not a lot, but that seems like a wasted opportunity. Get one with more disks so you can use RAID instead of mirroring, or at least get bigger disks so that you can store other things on it.

[PushedDover]

Arranguez said:

I'd like a physical storage backup as well as the cloud. I don't know why - call me someone born in 1977!

So if I pick a NAS drive (with the SMB connection/protocol) with two drives I can mirror them, connect to my router and backup through WiFi just by telling Time Machine about the new destination?

Of course, it won't look as nice as the subtle white object in the hall so that's one to prepare the arguments for with the missus!

I am like this too - I have DropBox for my filings, iCloud for my Apple-y stuff, as do the family - but also a NAS, probably as a hangover from days before high speed broadband allowing offsite back ups at scale.

I used to use a WD MyCloud, but as you say, technical challenges / changes to the Apple meant a shift.
A search on AI, a thread here too I think, and I ended up with a Synology DS120 attached to my Mesh network (hardwired) and the Mac's all back up over wifi to it through "Time Machine"

its clunky, and a PITA for a non-techy to set up I found, annoyingly needs me to go and delete / empty / free up space every few months.
I can only hope I never need to call upon it

[AndyTR]

There are peeps out there working around the problem using Samba, there's a couple of threads running on reddit and a GitHub page. https://github.com/jamesyc/TimeCapsuleSMB

[Suspicious_user]

Arranguez said:

I'd like a physical storage backup as well as the cloud. I don't know why - call me someone born in 1977!

So if I pick a NAS drive (with the SMB connection/protocol) with two drives I can mirror them, connect to my router and backup through WiFi just by telling Time Machine about the new destination?

Of course, it won't look as nice as the subtle white object in the hall so that's one to prepare the arguments for with the missus!

Something like this will work

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Synology-DS223J-Bay-Deskt...

then follow these instructions

https://kb.synology.com/en-global/DSM/tutorial/How...

[PushedDover]

Suspicious_user said:

Something like this will work

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Synology-DS223J-Bay-Deskt...

then follow these instructions

https://kb.synology.com/en-global/DSM/tutorial/How...

Dont disagree, but when I did this, it was not the effortless simplicity that an Apple User has become used to. i.e. a right fk about.
I, like the OP, wants to add a device that happily sits within my ecosystem and just works out of the box.

the instructions and actions were not that ^^^^ for me at least.

[Arranguez]

Thank you for the replies - really helpful. You are right Pushed; I was looking for that turn on, click yes, sit back and wallow in technical simplicity. I used to be an IT support engineer but those days are far behind me now.

[Derek Smith]

In 30 years, I've had two failures of internal HDDs, one catastrophic. I never want those problems again.

I have six external back up HDDs/SSDs. I back up my OS on two seperate and additional SSDs. I use one external SSD for temporary storage of specific files. Of the remainder, my personal files are held offsite as well as on two seperate HDDs in my office. I have a whole, uncompressed copy of each of my HDDs in my desktop. I store some images online, but not many. I have 117 videos, produced by me, on YouTube, plus stored on high quality on an HDD.

I used to store critical personal files online, but the service was withdrawn. I used to compress my stored files but once was unable to open some, thankfully unimportant, files so ditched that idea. I fully update each internal HDD/SSD regularly.

I used to buy an HDD/SSD annually, use it internally, and then use the replaced one as an external one, although the current high prices has stretched this to every 20 months.

[eeLee]

I was worried when I saw this but then I've been using Time Machine over SMB for years, connecting to a Synology over Tailscale. I back up from everywhere; it is a bit slow over some networks and the Tailscale on my Synology unit is not the most robust or fastest but we have two macbooks using it for backup.

So any SMB solution will work

[Suspicious_user]

Arranguez said:

Thank you for the replies - really helpful. You are right Pushed; I was looking for that turn on, click yes, sit back and wallow in technical simplicity. I used to be an IT support engineer but those days are far behind me now.

Then just ask here with what you're stuck on and some old bod will help you out.

[Magic919]

AndyTR said:

There are peeps out there working around the problem using Samba, there's a couple of threads running on reddit and a GitHub page. https://github.com/jamesyc/TimeCapsuleSMB

I just tried this on my old disused Time Capsule and it works a treat.