Time Capsule: A very frustrating product.

Since purchasing my TC I have twice had to erase it and start anew because it was no longer able to backup.
Now, I've been getting the following error message over the past couple of days:
"Time Machine Error
Unable to complete backup. A network problem may have interrupted the connection between your computer and the backup volume."
It tries to backup every hour on schedule and results in this error message. Anyone have any idea how I can fix this and resume by backups? I don't want to have to do a 3rd clean erase.

I have had my TC for a year now... I gave up trying to back up my G4 PowerBook and bought a new MacBook Pro last spring... the new one before the latest release. I have not tried to back up the 10 month old laptop but decided it was time. Yesterday started a back up of only 40GB and when going to bed 6 hours later still working and about 1/2 way finished. This morning woke up to the SAME OLD CRAP... back up was interruped back up failed.... WHAT A PIECE OF JUNK. I thought it was my old PowerBook but now it seems that was not the case. Any advise??????

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Since installation of Mavericks, Time Capsule works very slowly, and the next backup of 236 GM will take nearly 30 days. What can I do to get backup more rapidly ?

Since the installation of Mavericks, Time capsule works very slowly and will need 30 days or more to produce a complete backup of about 200 GB. What can I do to get a complete backup more rapidly ?

What setup is the TC now.. ? what model and what firmware? Maverick seems to need 7.6.4 on the older TC.. and latest firmware on the AC version.
Is it in router or bridge mode? Do not use wireless only.. join a wireless network.
Is the computer connected by wireless or ethernet? I strongly recommend a test by ethernet.. with wireless in the computer turned off. If it is still very slow something is majorly wrong.. but I need the info I asked for to troubleshoot further.

My time capsule runs very slowly and keeps disconnecting my internet connection, can anyone help me please?

Hello all I have recently pulled out my 3TB Time capsule and attempted to use it to back up my all Mac network, starting with just my desktop. I gave up on it before and started using Time Machine with WD EHD's which work fine. The reason that I gave up was that the Time Capsule kept freezing and hanging and I couldn't rely on it for a back up. I have reset it to factory settings and reconnected it as per the instructions, using it to extend my network, the hub is a BT infinity setup. Anyway it looks like it is going to run, then keeps shutting down my internet connection and I suspect it is taking longer to run the backup than it should. Has anyone else had this problem or can help please?

What model is the 3TB TC??
If the computer is using Yosemite the setup of the TC needs to be right. It can also be hardware issue if you are talking about the previous gen4.
Here is a list of things that can help with yosemite.
Factory reset universal
Power off the TC.. ie pull the power cord or power off at the wall.. wait 10sec.. hold in the reset button.. be gentle.. power on again still holding in reset.. and keep holding it in for another 10sec. You may need some help as it is hard to both hold in reset and apply power. It will show success by rapidly blinking the front led. Release the reset.. and wait a couple of min for the TC to reset and come back with factory settings. If the front LED doesn’t blink rapidly you missed it and simply try again. The reset is fairly fragile in these.. press it so you feel it just click and no more.. I have seen people bend the lever or even break it. I use a toothpick as tool.
N.B. None of your files on the hard disk of the TC are deleted.. this simply clears out the router settings of the TC.
Setup the TC again.
Then redo the setup from the computer with Yosemite.
1. Use very short names.. NOT APPLE RECOMMENDED names. No spaces and pure alphanumerics.
eg TCgen5 for basestation and and TCwifi wireless name.
If the issue is wireless use TC24ghz and TC5ghz with fixed channels as this also seems to help stop the nonsense. But this can be tried in the second round. ie plan on a first and second round of changes to fix this.. hopefully.. I will point out other steps that can be round2.
2. Use all passwords that also comply with 1. but can be a bit longer. ie 8-20 characters mixed case and numbers.. no non-alphanumerics.
3. If the TC is main router you can skip this point. This is only an issue when the TC is bridged.
Ensure the TC always takes the same IP address.. you will need to do this on the main router using dhcp reservation.. or a bit more complex setup using static IP in the TC. But this is important.. having IP drift all over the place when Yosemite cannot remember its own name for 5 min after a reboot makes for poor networking.
4. Check your share name on the computer is not changing.. make sure it also complies with the above.. short no spaces and pure alphanumeric.. but this change will mess up your TM backup.. so be prepared to do a new full backup. Sorry.. keep this one for second round if you want to avoid a new backup.
5. Mount the TC disk in the computer manually.
In Finder, Go, Connect to server from the top menu,
Type in SMB://192.168.0.254 (or whatever the TC ip is which you have now made static. As a router by default it is 10.0.1.1 and I encourage people to stick with that unless you know what you are doing).
You can use name.. SMB://TCgen5.local where you replace TCgen5 with your TC name.. local is the default domain of the TC and doesn't change.
However names are not so easy as IP address.. nor as reliable. At least not in Yosemite they aren't. The domain can also be an issue if you are not plugged or wireless directly to the TC.
6. Make sure IPv6 is set to link-local only in the computer. For example wireless open the network preferences, wireless and advanced / TCP/IP.. and fix the IPv6. to link-local only. Do the same for ethernet if you use it.
There is a lot more jiggery pokery you can try but the above is a good start.. if you find it still unreliable.. don't be surprised.
You might need to do some more work on the computer itself. eg Reset the PRAM.. has helped some people. Clean install of the OS is also helpful if you upgrade installed.
Tell us how you go.
Someone posted a solution.. See this thread.
Macbook can't find Time Capsule anymore
Start from the bottom and work up.. I have a list of good network practice changes but I have avoided Yosemites bug heaven.
Yosemite has serious DNS bug in the networking application.. here is the lets say more arcane method of fixing it by doing a network transplant from mavericks.
http://arstechnica.com/apple/2015/01/why-dns-in-os-x-10-10-is-broken-and-what-yo u-can-do-to-fix-it/

Time Capsule became very slow

Hello all,
Yesterday I decided to connect my time capsule (1tb) to my mac mini with an ethernet cable (cat6) instead of the wireless setup I have been using for quite some time. At first the transfer rate was high, as I expected, but then after an hour or two it became immensly slow. A file from 50mb would take over 30 minits to transfer from my timecapsule to the mac mini and vice versa.
I changed the timecapsule setup throught the airport configuration tool, but the only thing increasing the speed was to change the setting for the ethernet - wan - port to 1000 mb/s, however this ended in high transfer rates but I could no longer connect to the internet.
I started looking for solutions on the internet but all solutions did not solve my problem.
I changed the ACK from 3 to 0 without any results...
So that is why I posted this topic and I am desperately looking for help...

Are you reusing an old backup? That can be very slow.. you need to create a new backup for the new computer.
You need to figure out is this a general wireless issue.. or is it the TC just getting old.. a Gen2 is well past useby date.
Look at A1 here. http://pondini.org/TM/Troubleshooting.html
Or is that what you have there. Doesn't look like what I see in the Log.
Test by copying a single large file to the TC.. say 1GB and checking the speed. If that is fast. then you need to figure the old backup is not working well.
Also test with an ethernet connection so you can determine the issue is wireless or not.. when you test with ethernet shut off the wireless so it is not going to have two paths to the same destination.

Time Capsule disconnects very briefly, multiple times daily

Hello folks, I want to first say that I did attempt to find a solution to my issue within the forums, but couldn't really find anything matching my exact situation. Basically, my Time Capsule 2TB (4th Generation) has been disconnecting from the internet very briefly, usually 5-10 seconds. During this time, it flashes an amber indicator light. I recently upgraded to the latest firmware update, but that didn't seem to solve the issue. Could it be the cable modem that is faulty?
I appreciate any help!

It could be the cable modem.. and it doesn't even have to be faulty..
What model is the modem? The Apple routers seem to be having issues with some of the later motorola modems.. SB6121 and 6141 come up here fairly often.. the issue seems to be ethernet connection is playing up.
On the older Gen 4 you can fix it but only by using the v5 airport utility which allows you to set WAN ethernet speed.. set it to 100mbit full duplex and if still has trouble try 100mbit half duplex.
If you only have Mountain Lion then you will need to use a trick to install the older version.
Tell us if you need instructions or google them.

Restoring Time Machine backup from Time Capsule. Very slow times solved

For me at least . .
Like many people it seems, I have had enormous problems trying to restore data using Time Machine on a Time Capsule. The data had been backed up fine. The problem was the time for restore which initially was projected at 125 hours for 235GB. Reality suggested that (after 24 hours) this estimate was going to be about right and clearly unacceptable.
I cancelled the backup and read as much as I could across bulleting boards.
The main impression was of a howl of frustration from the many people who had experienced the same problem.
The collected actions below were assembled from many threads and ultimately ended in success. I hope they help.
My initial setup was as follows:
PowerMac G5 Power PC (2005) with 8GB DDR SDRAM (1000BaseT Ethernet connector). Mac OSX 10.5.8
1TB Time Capsule on Ethernet network via a 100BaseT Hub.
I was restoring to a 1TB USB 2.0 Seagate External Desktop Drive (ST3100005EXD101-RK) attached via a USB Hub to the G5.
Having read some threads, I did all of the following:
• I brought the TC into my home office and connected it directly to the Ethernet Port of the G5 to allow the most direct connection from TC to G5
• As suggested in one thread, I replaced the Cat5 ethernet cable I was using with a Cat5e cable (Cat6 is better) to allow 1000BaseT connection to the G5.
• I turned off Time Machine backups and MobileMe Sync.
• I terminated all unnecessary applications the computer
I restarted the restore and the result was the same.
I read more widely and then did the following:
• I reformatted the Seagate target drive using GUID and Mac OS Extended (Journaled). (Applications>Utilities>Disk Utility>choose top level of target drive>Partition>choose number of partitions under Volume Scheme (1 for me)>Options (button under partition window)>GUID Partition Table>Apply and wait quite a while. I had originally had it as Apple Partition Map and GUID was recommended on one particular thread.
• I plugged the target USB drive directly into the USB port on the front of the G5 to eliminate the hub as a potential cause of the slow data transfer.
• Readings suggested that Spotlight might be trying to index one or both of the TC and the target drive. To prevent this the author suggested adding the TC unit and the target drive to the Privacy tab of Spotlight (System Preferences>Spotlight>Privacy. Click + at bottom of window and navigate to target drive/s to add). Activity monitor showed as much data being sent as received so this seemed a likely contributor to the problem. I added both drives as described.
• Somewhere it was mentioned that IPv6 might be causing the problem. I turned it off (System Settings>Network>Built-In Ethernet>Advanced (bottom right of window)>choose “Off” in Configure IPv6 drop box.
• I unplugged the Internet connection from the TC to ensure no chance of this being a factor.
• My G5 doesn’t have an Airport but if you do you should also turn this off. You want to be quite certain that there are no connections that either the computer or the airport can channel data through other than the Ethernet cable.
• I don’t have anti virus software but this should also be turned off as it seems this was slowing down data transfer for many people.
• I shut down the G5, the USB target drive and the TC and restarted them all. After start up, I once again shut down all unnecessary programmes.
I restarted the Restore and, after the customary long wait as it added up all the files to transfer, it announced that the restore would take 4 hours (as opposed to the five days it had suggested previously).
Activity Monitor now shows data transfer rates of 17mb – 18mb per second and it looks like 4 hours is going to be about right. It also shows large amounts of data being received but now with negligible amounts being sent.
I’m afraid I don’t know which of the above is the bit that solved the problem. It could be a combination but I believe that if you do all the above, your restores / backups will all go at an acceptable speed.
A last note to thank all those individuals whose wise words I scoured for these instructions. I hope their collected suggestions are of some use to others.

The migration assistant or the original backup?
I tried WiFi, Ethernet and on the second attempt with a fresh backup on a USB drive.

Time capsule is very slow on wired Ethernet - tested from multiple sources

I purchased a 2 TB Time Capsule today. I want to use it for automatic backups of my Macbook, and I also want to use it to store files from my Windows PC's.
My TC is connected to my network using wred Ethernet only (Wireless is disabled in the TC)
My problem is that transferring files to the TC is incredibly slow. I have been doing some research and found lots of articles that talk about wireless interference and various problems with interoperability between WiFi flavors. None of these would seen to apply as I am using only wired Ethernet to transfer my files.
I also found a couple of discussions that describe how to make a change to the Mac's TCP/IP configuration to avoid a strange network condition slowing things down. This solution doesn't seem applicable as I am seeing the performance problem regardless of where I copy files FROM (I have a mixed environment with Windows and Linux and Mac systems)
Also, I am aware that the inital backup with Time Machine will be slow but I don't think that's relevant to my situation.
My TC is configured for file sharing so I can read and write files from my various Windows systems on the network. When I copy a set of large files to the TC, I see a typical transfer rate of 5 - 6 MB / Second. To me, this is completely abnormal and here is why: When I copy the same files, from the same Windows system, to a server on my network I get about 60 MB / second or about 10 times the transfer rates.
The TC is running firmware 7.4.2.
What gives?
Message was edited by: 92656iPhone

I also had the same issue. My Time Capsule was connect to the Linksys router WAG325N. I had a wireless network broadcasted from the Linksys and a different one from the Time Capsule. When connected to the TIme Capsule wireless network i pinked the Linksys router and got 10% to 30% pack loss. When i pinked the Time Capsule i got 0% loss. I used the AirPort Utility and changed the "Internet" "Ethernet WAN Port" from automatic to "10 Mbps/Full Duplex" and this seem to fix the slow internet.
I guess the Linksys and Time Capsule as issues with port speed negotiation.

Time Machine + Time Capsule + Wireless router = Frustration

I purchased a Time Capsule from an Apple Store about two months ago. I have a MBP core 2 duo. I connect to the Internet with a Verizon (Novatel) USB 727 wireless modem that is plugged in to a USB port on my Cradlepoint CTR-500 broadband wireless router that connect through Air Port. The Internet connection works great. But, when I set up Time Capsule (and I have done this many times) I get an error message that says that there is nothing connected to the Ethernet port - and it tells me to connect my router to this empty port. I have done this but the router is not recognized when I do. The "Air" in Airport seems to indicate that it is a wireless device but somehow Airport insists that I connect a wired router to the Time Capsule. I have updated all software including Airport Utility (version 5.5). Is this just something I have to live with or should my Time Capsule be able to handle a wireless modem? The only way I can get TC to work and allow an Internet connection is to plug the USB 727 into a USB port on the Mac. This would seem to be a good solution except that in that configuration Airport will not connect other computers to the Internet i.e., I cannot connect my other MBP wirelessly to the Internet through the Time Capsule. The TC shows up in Airport and the message "Looking for PPPoE host ..." scrolls across the Airport connection display in the info bar at the top of the screen but it never makes the connection to the Internet.
Also, the router and modem worked perfectly before I introduced the Time Capsule into the system. I could connect another Mac or even a Windows PC with no problem.
Thanks for any help,
Don

Hi Niel thanks I usee the wrong terminology I have in fact got a time capsule. The issue I had was the router my ISP sent me was making air play and air print work sporadically, only found out today that as you said the time capsule is a router as well. I was trying to set it up so that air play/print will work more consistently. So far so good. Thanks again for your input.

Time Capsule Wireless very slow

Hello,
I just installed my TC and it works quite well... but the wireless connection... To do my initial Back-up of 400 Go, it is taking 18 hours... How do I make it work faster?
Thanks

Assuming that you have setup the Time Capsule to create a network, and that it is connected to your modem using an Ethernet cable, temporarily connect another spare Ethernet cable from your Mac to one of the LAN <--> ports on the Time Capsule.
The backup will go 5-6 times faster this way. Once the initial backup is done, you can disconnect the Ethernet cable and use wireless for incremental backups, which should only take a few minutes on each pass.
However.....if you configured your Time Capsule to connect to your network wirelessly, then the Ethernet ports are not enabled on the Time Capsule, and you will need to backup using wireless.

For the past few days, firefox is taking a very long time to display pages, and often freezes for minutes at a time. Its very frustrating. It happens especially on facebook, but on every website lately.... what to do?

the amount of time it takes to load is so frustrating that i close firefox and use other methods 2 get onto the web. i would rather use firefox, but time is a commodity. please help.

Your MyWebSearch plug-in is the cause of many problems. Google for information and advice on how to get rid of it.
If that doesn't help, you should work your way through this(Safe Mode,Problematic extensions etc ) -
https://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Troubleshooting%20extensions%20and%20themes
Make sure your plug-ins such as Flash are up-to-date -
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/plugincheck/
Try disabling third party toolbars.
Report back.

Time Capsule with very slow network throughput

I have a TC that is only supply about 5% of the network throughput it should do.
We ahve a 2MB connection and any computer that is connecting to the TC wirelessly is only getting around 0.1MB. The signal is strong, the noise is low, it's on an isolated channel (no other networks overlapping). It does this regardless of whether I switch to wireless-g or wireless-n (2.4GHz or 5GHz) and regardless of which channel I select.
I plugged in a different TC and I got my 2MB connection no problem.
So I think the first TC is knackered. Luckily it's still under the 90 warrantee. I want to return it to get a replacement, but I can't get through to the apple care telephone service. I've been on hold for 20 mins then got cut off without talking to anyone - this happens every time I call. Why on earth anyone would pay for apple care is beyond me if you can't even get through to Apple!
Can you just take a TC back to an Apple Store and get a straightforward replacement?

Sorted it! I hit the factory reset button on the back and started again from scratch.
There must have been some software issue in the TC itself that could not be addressed through the configuration interface.
I hope this helps anyone who has a similar problem. In summary this is what I was experiencing:
1. When connected Mac Mini to TC with ethernet cable I had top speed access - so no drive writing issues.
2. Set up the TC to share our 2Mb internet connection as a wireless-g network. When connected a laptop to TC via the TC's wireless-g network I had excellent signal strength, low noise, and an uncluttered channel (as indicated by iStumbler) - so no interference issues with other netowrks, microwaves, cordless phones etc.
3. The laptop reported an excellent signal strength and potential rate of 54Mb.
4. Used an online broadband speed tester (www.cnet.co.uk/misc/speedtest) on the laptop to determine the actual throughput. The result was around 0.2Mb. Not good.
5. Tried copying a file from the TC over to the laptop and monitored the throughput using the laptop's performance monitor. The result was still around 0.2MB.
6. Tried changing the wireless-g channel. Same result.
7. Repeated the above with a wireless-n network. Same result.
8. Finally, hit the factory reset and repeated points 2 - 4 above. Got almost 2Mb, which is what I was after!
Hope this helps someone.

Time capsule running very slow under OS X 10.8.5 (12F45)

Having great difficulty completing a back up. So far taken 3 hrs to back up 5gb out of 100gbs

You are not trying to use wireless for backup, are you?
A wired Ethernet connection should take between 3-4 hours for backup. Wireless will be anywhere from 5-10 times or more slower, depending on your particular connection and the capabilities of the wireless devices.

Time Capsule Archive very slow... or stuck

I put my TC to archive yesterday to a USB 2T iomega drive... all initial steps went well but later on the next day the TC is still with an amber light and nothing has happened, is this normal, should it take so long... I had about 450 GB of information in the TC so I don't know it this is a lot or not.
Also, is there anyway to know the progress of this archive?
thank you,
eric

Nope that is not normal.
The SOLID AMBER light means that the operating system on the TC is loading... so it's not actually even running when you see that.
Try again - and when you start the Time Machine backup - you should have the time machine indicator up on the finder bar is OSX that spins when it is backing up - click on that - it will give you a real-time progress of the backup.

My MacBook Pro keeps telling me there was a problem connecting to a time capsule that no longer exists on my network.

The error showing states "There was a problem connecting to the server 'name of my old time capsule' ". However, that time capsule has since been replaced by a new time capsule. Why does my computer continue to try to connect to the old time capsule. It has no trouble connecting to the new time capsule. In fact, while conducting a Time Machine backup to the new Time Capsule, the error message popped up concerning the old time capsule. Very frustrating because this message stays on top of other windows and when it pops up, I must stop what I am doing to to make it go away. Right now, I just push the box off to the side so it doesn't cover any of my windows. That doesn't solve the real problem, though.

System Preferences -------> Time Machine
Select the correct disk you want to back up to (new device), click on the old disk in Time Machine preferences, ----------> Remove Disk

Time capsule disk operations very slow

Hello,
My time capsule became very slow since a few days.
File transfert from any computer s(Mac and PC) on the network to the tme capsule is now extremely slow. Does not matter if I user Ethernet or Airport.
No configuration change have been made neither network change.
Thanks in advance for any help.

-To sum up things: The setting "DHCP + NAT" delivers fast copying speeds
Yes. You will eliminate the backroute to the fiber modem or maybe even back to your ISP - depending on their setup.
The standard setting of the router is "DHCP + NAT" right?
Normally the standard setting is good enough to obtain an internet connection instantly (without filling in IP, DNS etc. manually).
Yes, you shoudl not have to fill in those details. Should work straight away as your MBP gets thos edetails automatically (yes?)
best to reset the Airport Extreme to defaults and connect it again using DHCP / NAT

Time Capsule: A very frustrating product.

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