Reliability of TM via Airport Extreme

[adam9c1]

I have a 3rd gen Airport Extreme and I'm thinking of connecting a USB HD to run TM from.
Is this type of setup working OK?

Wikipedia states this is not officially supported (is that info wrong / out of date)?

 

[belvdr]

I used that method for years without issue.

 

[Weaselboy]

I have a 3rd gen Airport Extreme and I'm thinking of connecting a USB HD to run TM from.
Is this type of setup working OK?

Wikipedia states this is not officially supported (is that info wrong / out of date)?

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202784

It is not officially supported and I would not risk my data with this setup. Some people have no issues with it, but many do.

 

[belvdr]

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202784

It is not officially supported and I would not risk my data with this setup. Some people have no issues with it, but many do.

Funny, it used to be supported on the 4th gen as well. I guess they wanted to sunset support older model support. I can't say I blame them.

 

[Weaselboy]

Funny, it used to be supported on the 4th gen as well. I guess they wanted to sunset support older model support. I can't say I blame them.

My memory may be off, but I don't think it was ever supported on the Extreme until the new AC model.

 

[belvdr]

My memory may be off, but I don't think it was ever supported on the Extreme until the new AC model.

It was one of features Apple touted if you wanted to bring your own hard drive, which I did because, at the time, the Time Capsule power supplies seemed to religiously fail at 18 months.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/AirPort_Extreme
[doublepost=1490817076][/doublepost]Also, Apple says it is supported here:

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202807

I am not sure which is authoritative.

 

[Weaselboy]

This is at the bottom of your link. I really think it is just the AC models that are supported.

Time Machine support for USB disks

OS X Time Machine supports compatible unencrypted USB disks connected to AirPort Time Capsule (802.11n and 802.11ac), and AirPort Extreme (802.11ac).

 

[belvdr]

This is at the bottom of your link. I really think it is just the AC models that are supported.

Good catch. I misread that. Strange they would support 802.11n TC but not AE.

 

[kwikdeth]

you're confusing USB disk sharing and using that disk as a time capsule. Apple does not consider the two the same thing. The disk sharing on airport was merely intended to be a sort of home NAS for multiple computers to access. Apple never officially supported time capsule disk usage on airports prior to the AC.