MacBook Air and Time Capsule

[dahcheet]

A couple of clarifications for the newbie I am (sorry if some of them really simple):

1. how do you get your external IP address ?

2. what is AEBS (told you, some realy simple !) ?

Thanks...

I know AEBS is Airport Extreme Base Station which is used for wireless networking. Not sure what the protocol is for attaining your external IP address is though. I think iStat (widget) might list it but I'm sure there are other means.

 

[aristobrat]

I think iStat (widget) might list it but I'm sure there are other means.

Yup, the iStat widgets work well, or you can use the Airport Utility and look at the WAN status to see what the external IP address is.

 

[sidharth80]

The way it worked with the AEBS, you'd remotely access a shared USB drive by going to Finder > Go > Connect to Server, and using afp://yourExternalIpAddress/NameOfYourDrive


Same results here using an AEBS. It came with a tool called AirPort Disk Utility that would automatically connect your Mac to a drive shared by an AEBS, but it stopped working when I upgraded to Leopard. I had hoped that TC would ship with a newer version of this.

Thanks for the info... I have some more qns
- How do I access the drive connected to AEBS from a PC? is it the same as you mentioned above?
- My istat shows me a IP address - is that my externalIpAddress? Does it stay constant all the time?
- How do I assign a name to the drive attached to AEBS?

I know some of the questions are silly... but being a newbie.. i have no clue abt this...
Thanks in advance..1

 

[ViperrepiV]

Let's say you had some music stored locally on the computer, and the bulk stored on a time capsule. You have this all loaded into your itunes library, and everything works well while you are at home.

Now lets say you are using your air away from home, and you want to listen to music. You should still be able to listen to the music stored locally. But will everything still show up in itunes (and refuse to play the songs that were stored on the now unreachable time capsule)?

Assuming this was the case, it might be hard to remember what is stored locally (and thus what will actually play) and what is stored remotely (and thus will not play)I guess if you wanted to differentiate, you could have everything in your library as you had before, but have a play list that only contains local music, so this way you can browse through and listen to music that you know you will be able to play, when you are away from home.

 

[aristobrat]

- How do I access the drive connected to AEBS from a PC? is it the same as you mentioned above?
- My istat shows me a IP address - is that my externalIpAddress? Does it stay constant all the time?
- How do I assign a name to the drive attached to AEBS?

I'm not sure how to access the drive connected from the AEBS remotely. To access it locally, you have to install a program on the PC from the CD that came with the AEBS. Maybe that program allows remote access?

On my iStat nano, if you click on the Network area, it shows both my internal and external IP address. It's the external one that you're after. How often it changes depends on your Internet provider, but most usually change at some point.

You have to format and the name the drive on a Mac before you plug it into an AEBS.

Not sure if all of these things stay the same with on a Time Capsule.

 

[Chad H]

Did anybody fix the mounting problem? I too got it mounted on the desktop and renamed it "Time Capsule". I also created a folder in that called i-Tunes and pointed i-Tunes there so all my music/tv shows are off of my MBA and now on my time capsule. I even have it synced with my Apple TV. Its working fine, even when I download something on my MBA through i-Tunes I hear the time capsule crank up and write it to the i-Tunes folder I created. But, the random dismounting is beginning to annoy. Any ideas or suggestions?

 

[teerexx52]

Did anybody fix the mounting problem? I too got it mounted on the desktop and renamed it "Time Capsule". I also created a folder in that called i-Tunes and pointed i-Tunes there so all my music/tv shows are off of my MBA and now on my time capsule. I even have it synced with my Apple TV. Its working fine, even when I download something on my MBA through i-Tunes I hear the time capsule crank up and write it to the i-Tunes folder I created. But, the random dismounting is beginning to annoy. Any ideas or suggestions?

So far I have not been able to come up with any solution. When I called Apple they said this was "normal" operation for TC,

 

[Chad H]

Well to be frank its kinda pissing me off. Now, with that said I never reboot my computer. But, have you noticed after it sleeps for a long time or gets done backing it dismounts also? Last thing, have you left it unmounted and opened i-tunes to see what would or does happen?

 

[Terwal]

Remote access to Apple tv... to get to TC ?

If you have a local mac running I dont see why you couldnt use back to my mac or a similar program to remotely connect your air to the local mac and view your files on the TC that way.

Without a local mac running, no you will not be able to access TC.

In another thread, I believe somebody wrote that apple tv should basically considered as a mini hooked to your tv.

if it is the case, would it be possible to remotely access apple tv from my mba, as a way to remotely access my tc ?

thanks...

w.

 

[Tom J]

just throwing my two cents worth in here.

Time Capsule is a multi-user backup device right? You can use it to back up all your macs at home.

Is it possible that TC only mounts when one of the Mac's needs to activate it for Time Machine and unmounts it when done? Thereby "releasing" it for another Mac. It is a "server" in the sense that only one Mac can mount and use it at a time. Unless, of course, you manually mount and unmount it.

Would this explain the odd mounting issues?

 

[macdent]

Find the external drive in TC?

I have TC up and running and have attached a external HD via USB to the TC. How now do I find the HD drive to work with it?????
Thought I would see it with Finder and bring up the TC, but not there ... . any ideas?

 

[twynne]

I have TC up and running and have attached a external HD via USB to the TC. How now do I find the HD drive to work with it?????
Thought I would see it with Finder and bring up the TC, but not there ... . any ideas?

I don't have a TC (just the Airport Extreme) but if it's the same you have to enable the disk in Airport Utility.

 

[Chad H]

just throwing my two cents worth in here.

Time Capsule is a multi-user backup device right? You can use it to back up all your macs at home.

Is it possible that TC only mounts when one of the Mac's needs to activate it for Time Machine and unmounts it when done? Thereby "releasing" it for another Mac. It is a "server" in the sense that only one Mac can mount and use it at a time. Unless, of course, you manually mount and unmount it.

Would this explain the odd mounting issues?

I believe that it explains it. Because I have to manualy go in and open it up to mount it. But once it does back up, it un-mounts itself I have noticed. Anybody have this happen? If so, I think that explains it perfectly.

 

[teerexx52]

I believe that it explains it. Because I have to manualy go in and open it up to mount it. But once it does back up, it un-mounts itself I have noticed. Anybody have this happen? If so, I think that explains it perfectly.

I find I must connect it before it will do any backups

 

[macdent]

twynne-

thanks for the reply - one more step if you don't mind!

How do I "enable the disk in Airport Utility." Step -by-step if you don't mind!
New to this sort of thing.
Thanks -

 

[grimslade]

I can't get my Air to find the shared drive on the TC.

 

[teerexx52]

I can't get my Air to find the shared drive on the TC.

Did you click on time capsule in your finder?

 

[Chad H]

twynne-

thanks for the reply - one more step if you don't mind!

How do I "enable the disk in Airport Utility." Step -by-step if you don't mind!
New to this sort of thing.
Thanks -

Well I know that when I go into my Airport Utility it doesn't look like everyone else's. I don't have any options.

 

[twynne]

twynne-

thanks for the reply - one more step if you don't mind!

How do I "enable the disk in Airport Utility." Step -by-step if you don't mind!
New to this sort of thing.
Thanks -

This may vary with Time Capsule (as I assume it comes with a new airport utility), but in mine:

Select your Airport device and go to manual setup.
Click on 'Disks' along the top (you should see the connected drive in the list)
Click on 'File Sharing', then 'Enable File Sharing'.

Then you'll need to choose how to control access. I personally use the base station password, but you can review options.

Let me know how you get on.

 

[grimslade]

Did you click on time capsule in your finder?

Time capsule doesn't show up in the finder. Time Machine can find it and the backups go normally. The Airport Utility can see it. But the finder doesn't see it. Grr.

EDIT: Oh, and my iMac can see the shared drive and read from it and write to it. Strange.

 

[BWhaler]

Nice review, and thanks for posting it.

You've convinced me to go buy the 1TB model. This looks like the perfect solution.

 

[teerexx52]

Time capsule doesn't show up in the finder. Time Machine can find it and the backups go normally. The Airport Utility can see it. But the finder doesn't see it. Grr.

EDIT: Oh, and my iMac can see the shared drive and read from it and write to it. Strange.

Can't figure it

 

[aristobrat]

I believe that it explains it. Because I have to manualy go in and open it up to mount it. But once it does back up, it un-mounts itself I have noticed. Anybody have this happen? If so, I think that explains it perfectly.

Just noticed that behavior tonight for the first time myself!

I had always been under the impression that I had to mount the drive manually before TM would do its thing, which I thought was stupid.

Tonight I booted up, didn't mount any of my usual mounts, and was quite surprised to see Time Machine spinning away, backing up stuff. Yay.

 

[Tom J]

Just noticed that behavior tonight for the first time myself!

I had always been under the impression that I had to mount the drive manually before TM would do its thing, which I thought was stupid.

Tonight I booted up, didn't mount any of my usual mounts, and was quite surprised to see Time Machine spinning away, backing up stuff. Yay.

Clarifying: So this is transparent to the user? Time Machine mounts Time Capsule when necessary but its hard to know this because it doesn't show up in the finder? Apple wanted this to be a background process and didn't want to surprise the user with drives popping up and disappearing?

 

[aristobrat]

Clarifying: So this is transparent to the user? Time Machine mounts Time Capsule when necessary but its hard to know this because it doesn't show up in the finder? Apple wanted this to be a background process and didn't want to surprise the user with drives popping up and disappearing?

Its been almost transparent to me.

To test it, I just unmounted my Time Capsule drive (which I had mounted as I was copying files out to the non-Time Machine area of the drive).

When I unmounted it, the Time Capsule drive disappeared from my desktop (as expected).

I clicked on Time Machine and told it to "Backup Now". 5 seconds later, a disk image appears on my desktop and the Time Machine backup started.