Use time capsule drive for mass storage instead of time machine

I'm considering buying a new Airport Extreme with the time capsule drive.  I'd interested to know if I can use the built in drive as an additional HD verses using it for a back up drive with time machine?  I'm aware I can plug in a USB external drive for network storage, but would like to use the built one for storage as well.  Anyone know if this is possible?

I just got a 2TB time capsule a few days ago to use as a "poor man's file server" for my iTunes library. Bob makes valid points, and I am aware of the limitations, but I think it will meet my needs for awhile. I am in the process of ripping a large DVD collection and my iTunes library is over 350gb which was starting to feel crowded on my MBA's 512gb SSD.
I have plenty of external USB and thunderbolt drives, but I wanted wireless access to the libary anywhere in the house. With the AC wireless on my 2013 MBA, I wouldn't really classify the time capsule as "quite slow", I'm seeing about 30MB/s for FInder file copies. I have a 1TB USB2 WD Passport drive and the speed is very comparable - about 35MB/s. Sure, it's not as fast as my thunderbolt drive at 190MB/s or SSD at 700MB/s, but it seems to work well for my content (I don't use HD video in iTunes).
The only noticeable issue is that the TC disk spins down almost immediately if it isn't in use, so you get a lag of a few seconds if you pause a movie for a minute. And it takes longer to start iTunes of course. For me, these were acceptable trade-offs to allow my library to grow to 2TB without any directly connected external storage.
I wanted an AC router regardless and the TC gives me a wireless disk for $100 more. In the future I can always add a "real" media server and let the TC do backups. But for now I'm happy with the way it works.

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