Customer Reviews and Ratings

3.0 out of 5 stars

Based on 252 reviews

  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    Terrific unless you let it overheat, after which it's garbage

    • Written by from Burnaby

    46 of 48 people found this useful

    The pros:
    - Easy to set up
    - Makes backing up your information completely automatic

    The con, and it's a big one:
    - The physical design of the enclosure, for some reason, covers the entire ventilation grid and fan output with a thick impermeable rubber "foot." As a result, the unit overheats very easily, and once it has overheated badly even once, it will act flaky from then on: "Unable to complete backup" with any of about 20 different random errors on every backup attempt (could not mount drive, network issue, permissions issue, could not find time capsule, unknown error, etc, etc, etc). If you buy one of these, once you've turned it on to make sure it works in general, you need to unplug it again and 1) permanently remove the rubber foot from the bottom and 2) set the unit on top of some kind of mesh riser to allow airflow through the bottom of the unit.

    From a software perspective, it's still one of the best Apple backup solutions out there, but the enclosure design is laughably problematic.

    Was this useful? Terrific unless you let it overheat, after which it's garbage

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  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    Great, but not five stars

    • Written by from Gillingham

    22 of 26 people found this useful

    Its a great product, but the wireless and the USB connections are very slow. Why on earth would apple make this product USB 2.0 when most people using it are exclusively apple users and would prefer a Thunderbolt or USB 3.0 connection. I get
    that not everyone is using apple, but give the applephiles the option, we as demographic of customers are not by default stupid.
    To be honest with you, instead of the time machine, you are better off paying a bit more for a LaCie 2big hard drive and run it in RAID or JBOD configuration with a Thunderbolt connection, with the option to expand the memory.
    Thats what I have done, you can purchase my Time capsule on eBay if you wish. Having transfer speeds up to 4Gb/s via Thunderbolt is far more attractive.

  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    Very easy to manage.

    • Written by from Suwanee

    27 of 28 people found this useful

    Airport utility is a ver user friendly router management tool, in true Apple Style. Very high quality. You can barely hear it, even when the drive is being used (soft ticking sound like you would hear with an internal drive)

    My only quarrel with it is that its not really designed to be an external storage device, it works best as just a backup destination. Connecting is clunky and in my opinion not designed for storing pictures, videos, or anything else other than Time Machine backups. You can't partions time capsules (easily) without affecting stability and data security.

  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    Meh

    • Written by from Gardnerville

    69 of 73 people found this useful

    Purchased December 27, 2011 after hard drive in my MacbookPro (Early 2011) died earlier in the month. Apple was kind enough to replace with larger drive. I know of no other company that would've done that. Used it as a backup disk and wireless router until late August 2012 with very, very few issues. I really did forget about the backups because they occurred int he background seamlessly until Aug 2012, when I had an issue with MacbookPro that required Apple to reinstall Mountain Lion. Thankfully, I was able to restore from my backups on TIme Machine. Saved my hide. All my backups were there. Genius Bar recommended I keep my backsups, but begin a full new backup. Made sense. Since the, I've had a terrible time with TC. After backup errors persisted, I was advised to erase disk with old backups (not a huge deal, but definitely not my first choice). This worked until Mid-September when I was unable to get TM to backup to TC properly. Consulted support community with no luck. Apple Care rep was able to get things back to working order.

    I just feel like since the problems began, it's taken too much time and energy than I would expect. Glad I have TC, but it definitely isn't as intuitive or user friendly as one should expect from Apple. Could definitely use some improvements. Despite problems, I think I'd still go with TC over other drives just because of support form Apple

  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    Missing features.

    • Written by from fountain valley

    28 of 36 people found this useful

    There is iTV, and there's Time Capsule, but the two cannot play together to stream local movie files on the TC. Mind you Apple that not movies are bought through iTunes. Apple should also create an easier way to connect network printers (not thru USB) and this may be the game buster since they are the one who invented Bonjour.

  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    Crashed but HD was still good.

    • Written by from Salisbury

    73 of 79 people found this useful

    I had 2 of the 500gig TC's. My first one just died but I think it was just the power supply went south. I pulled the Hard Drive out, purchased an HD USB Caddy and all of my files were still there. Transferred the files over and all is well. I do agree for the price of the TC it needs to last longer, but DON'T throw your HD out until you check it. The caddy cost $50 from Best Buy and saved me a lot of heartache...

    Was this useful? Crashed but HD was still good.

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  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    Good product but won't last

    • Written by from NEW YORK

    58 of 62 people found this useful

    If you are ok buying one about ever year then its worth the cost. It does a good job but then the disc fails or in my case gets a point of slowing down so much the product is not useful. It would be a welcome product in my home again if Apple could offer a better drive that works faster and is more reliable. Plus there is only hourly back ups available which ends up once an hour killing your machine while the back up happens. Just not a very configurable tool. Also if you are running 10.7 or up it will crawl once you do the install.

    Was this useful? Good product but won't last

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  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    Not recommended as a share drive.

    • Written by from Boston

    51 of 52 people found this useful

    This may be a fine solution for a time-machine backup, but I do not recommend it as a wireless share drive for a time to centrally store and swap files.

    We've been using a Time Capsule at our office as a share drive for a couple of years now. We haven't lost data (I've hear some say that they're unstable) but it is CONSTANTLY crashing my machine when trying to copy or delete relatively large chunks of data (500 MB+).

    If you are only using this as a Time-Machine backup, or if you have limited need to move data, this might be a fine solution. But if you have large video, image, or other groups of files that you need to move, copy, or delete, steer clear.

    We've finally gotten a LaCie server (15TB for about $1,700) and even migrating bit by bit from the Time Capsule machine has me banging my head against the desk. I want to throw this thing out the window.

    I only give it three stars because I realize it may do a good job as a regular Time-Machine backup.

    Was this useful? Not recommended as a share drive.

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  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    So far so good, once I got it going...

    • Written by from Galloway

    32 of 37 people found this useful

    Call it 3 and 1/2 stars, mainly because set-up was not as easy as it should have been. I received my time capsule yesterday, and spent three frustrating hours trying to get it connected to my computers. A word of advice? Unplug or turn off your cable modem, and plug it back in at the same time you plug in the time capsule. TC doesn't recognize the internet connection unless the cable router is reset.

    Now that it's up? It's good; behaves as advertised and is able to share the drive with multiple computers. I also used it to replace a very old AirPort Express access point. I will update my review in a few months after I get to see whether it creates any problems in the longer haul.

    Was this useful? So far so good, once I got it going...

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  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    Out of Time Capsule

    • Written by from Charlotte

    66 of 73 people found this useful

    As a long term solution you would be better off buying a stand alone back up device and if you need wireless get a wireless router. I am about to be on my 3rd time capsule in 2 1/2 years.

    For ease of use, set-up and trouble free operation (if it is working) is excellent though. It is beyond my understanding why the do not last longer? Planned obsolescence I guess?

  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    airport extreme base

    • Written by from CORONA

    48 of 54 people found this useful

    I bought like two years ago and suddenly stopped working, it was good but I think that last longer!

  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    Life span is 1.5 to 2 years

    • Written by from Edson

    80 of 82 people found this useful

    I bought one about 2 years ago and though the world of the machine. It is a powerful and fast router and also seamlessly performed regular backup functions. It was the easiest back up device I have ever owned I set it up once and forgot about it. The other day it reminded me how important it was. Because IT DIED. I did a lot of sniffing around on the internet and found out that due to poor cooling the typical life span of one of these units is about 20 months. There is a lot of sites to go to re: mods and repairs for them so I guess I'll have to warm up the old soldering iron. It is not covered by warranty or re-call so it seems the best option is a total re-build in my spare time.....

    Was this useful? Life span is 1.5 to 2 years

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  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    Longevity an issue

    • Written by from Greensboro

    148 of 167 people found this useful

    Worked well until it died. Did not make it 2 years. Unable to recover data now.

  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    Time Capsule won't work with Lion?

    • Written by from Chicago

    83 of 107 people found this useful

    I used Time Capsule for over a year with no problems. After a power outage, however, the dating started from the day power was restored. Now it doesn't work at all since I installed Lion.

    Was this useful? Time Capsule won't work with Lion?

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  • 3.0 out of 5 stars

    A MEDIOCRE DEVICE

    • Written by from misawa

    49 of 84 people found this useful

    Honestly i love my TC but its lack of THUNDERBOLT CAPABILITY and DLNA capability, is quite upright worthless for its price. I only say this because lets get this right some of us students like being able to connect to our network hard dive using our apple tv, iPad and iPhone but having to always have our mac every time to access its kinda stupid. I have a xbox 360 i play video games, music and movies with and but i can't even do that because the TC will not share any of my media. I don't understand why apple can't just have some type home sharing ability built into the TC capability, I truly regret buying my TC i would have been better off with A WD my book live. Apple needs to step there game up to keep there simplistic approach to everything will eventually lose their loyal customers.