Timecapsule causes lags and unresponsiveness in iTunes and VLC

Question

Hi, I don't know whether this is really a problem of my TC, so I'd even like some hints on diagnostics...
However, I have TC for two months (the new 2 TB one) and just recently I noticed that videos on VLC are sometimes getting scrambled and paused (you know, when the picture freezes and then moves to another one seconds later accompanied by big black areas and small squares). I thought that this was a problem with update of VLC and I tried to set a bigger buffer for streaming. However, the program then becomes unresponsive. Just now I noticed that similar problem is happening even with iTunes and files that I have stored on TC (I double-click a song, have to wait, and after 3 - 5 secs it starts to play).
To be honest, I don't know whether this was happening right after I bought TC, because I left my favorite tracks on my MacBook. Also, after buying a TC, I upgraded to Mavericks, so a lot of things have changed for me.
I also haven't find any similar issues with TC on the internet (being a non-english speaker, it could just be my bad choice of keywords)
Before I blame everything on TC and will have to use my warranty, do you know whether this is an issue of TC? Can I do some diagnostics first? Or use any other program? Could this be a software issue?
Thank you a lot

Answer 1

"TC hard disk is designed to spin down at the earliest opportunity" - is this something that could be overridden?
No, the TC is not a NAS.. there is no controls whatsoever.
"will take several seconds to spin up.. so when you select a song" - that I understand, however, this is happening also on skipping to the next when the disk should be already active, no?
If the computer is caching and enough of the song is sent the disk will spin down. That is exactly how it is designed. It is for Time Machine backups not streaming media.
I unfortunatelly cannot play anything over ethernet (my MB Air does not have an input), so I am talking about playing from WiFi, but I'll try to borrow a computer
Buy a thunderbolt to ethernet adapter.. apple sell them very cheap now.
So my question mostly is - something was OK, now it is not, is it a problem of updated VLC (and iTunes' lag is just normal) or is it a problem of TC and should I have it replaced?
Did it work on Mavericks.. if you think back was it actually working before you upgraded to Mavericks and then stopped because that makes a lot of sense. Mavericks and the TC do not get along at all well.
You need to do some testing..
But first of all, reset the TC to factory..
Setup with all short names, no spaces and pure alphanumeric.
Give 5ghz wireless a different name.. make sure the speed of connection with TC is full for your version MBA.. ie if it AC make sure you have AC.. if it is earlier version make sure you get full 450mbps.
During a transfer make sure the speed does not drop off significantly.. it will drop but should not be a huge amount.
Otherwise it is just the wrong equipment for the job. Plug a simple usb drive into the Air and it will all work as it should.