USB drive attached to Airport Extreme as a time machine backup?

I have a WD 750gb external USB drive that I was using as a "time machine" with my iMac. My Airport Extreme has a USB port and I want to move the WD over to there, but continue to use it as time machine. Possible to do this? If yes, then how?
Thanks much

You can, but Time Machine uses a disk image file for the Time Machine archive (instead of a folder) when a network drive is used. Therefore, you may have to start your Time Machine archive over again.
If you have one Mac to back up with Time Machine, it is better to leave the drive attached directly to the computer over USB. Your initial and hourly Time Machine backups will complete faster.

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    I recently upgraded from a 4th generation Airport Extreme (short, dual band n) to a new 6th generation Airport Extreme (tall, dual-band ac) in the hopes of having quicker backups and better WiFi performance (I also just got a 13" retina MacBook Pro).
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    I tried a few things that didn't work, and I suspected that maybe the backup "transfer" hadn't gone so smoothly as it seemed, so I decided to erase the drive using Disk Utility and start the backup over again. To my disappointment, I found that the backup got about 200MB-1.5GB into the backup and "froze." I left it overnight, and it was at exactly the same place the next morning. The light on the disk connected to the Airport Extreme flashed constantly all the time, and I could hear it spinning, but nothing happened at all.
    When I tried to stop the backup, it took a very long time. In the logs, I would see a message like this (this log is from my machine, not my wife's, but it looks the same):
    11/19/13 9:40:59.276 PM com.apple.backupd[93334]: Forcing deep traversal on source: "***-mpbr" (device: /dev/disk0s2 mount: '/' fsUUID: 7356274E-D28F-3BC0-9CA8-7F1AA21830B4 eventDBUUID: 99941F9A-AD5F-4FAF-94D2-701C94CA9581)
    11/19/13 9:41:57.609 PM com.apple.backupd[93334]: Total content size: 148.2 GB excluded items size: 17.16 GB for volume ***-mpbr
    11/19/13 9:41:57.610 PM com.apple.backupd[93334]: Found 674166 files (131.05 GB) needing backup
    11/19/13 9:41:57.611 PM com.apple.backupd[93334]: 152.52 GB required (including padding), 498.67 GB available
    11/19/13 9:41:57.625 PM com.apple.backupd[93334]: Waiting for index to be ready (100)
    11/19/13 9:59:22.407 PM UserEventAgent[11]: com.apple.backupd-auto launchd job disabled
    11/19/13 10:00:15.103 PM com.apple.backupd[93334]: Cancellation timed out - exiting
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    Through all of the above, the hard disk kept spinning and the light flashed constantly. The drive was warm to the touch in the morning.
    I also found that when all this happened, I was unable to connect to the Airport device using Airport Utility. I I couldn't administer it, but the Internet continued to work for all connected devices. Unplugging the disk and plugging it back in worked immediately to bring the system back to a working state. I didn;t even have to power-cycle or reset the Airport Extreme.
    I tried a number of things to correct this behavior:
    Disabled Time Machine, removed disk, restarted machine, reconfigured Time Machine, and retried.
    Tried backup on my 13" Retina MacBook Pro and my wife's MacBook Air.
    I actually tried with TWO new 6th Generation Airport Extremes. The first one was a refurbished one. I returned it to Apple and purchased a brand new one. Both of them exhibited the behavior I described above.
    Workaround:
    Finally, I switched the drive out for a spare that I have (an older Western Digital MyBook and used it for a backup. This drive "Just worked."
    So, I have switched to that for backup for now, and re-purposed the LaCie as a drive that I use for making periodic images of my hard drive using SuperDuper. The drive seems to work perfectly (and worked perfectly for several years with older Airport Extreme base stations), so I can only assume there's a bug in the USB driver of the current 6th-generation Airport Extreme.
    I hope this helps someone else who's as confused as I was. If anyone has had a similar experience, I would very much like to read about it. I will be reporting this problem to apple right after I post this topic. Please do the same if you experience this issue.

    As Bob says, backing-up that way isn't supported.
    It's also unreliable. It may work for a while, but this forum, and the Time Machine forums, have many, many posts like this:
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    In my case, it's happened about 4 times in a year. And that's with a desktop Mac, about 12 feet from the Airport, with the exact same hardware in exactly the same place and no interference.
    It is very convenient, especially with laptops. If you want to take the risk, see [Using Time Machine with an Airport Extreme Air Disk|http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/Airport.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).
    But do yourself a LARGE favor and take the prominent advice to keep secondary backups, and update them frequently. Sooner or later, you're probably going to need them.

  • Is it possible to use NAS storage (which is wired via LAN to AirPort Extreme) as a Time Machine destination?

    Is it possible to use NAS storage (WD My Cloud EX2 or WD My Cloud EX4) which is wired via LAN to current AirPort Extreme, as a Time Machine backup destination?
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    I have a concern with my primal idea of backing up via WiFi, as I tend to handle big files when doing music production or movie editing. I wonder if this affect the performance of MacBook Pro, as it might take more time to complete each backup via WiFi.
    Many thanks for your advice in advance,
    Masa
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    Processor 2.6 GHz Intel Core i7
    Memory 16GB 1600 MHz DDR3

    I would appreciate any advice which could include aother sollition of secure and practical backup.

  • Can Time Machine back up a USB Drive connected to Airport Extreme?

    If I connect 2 USB drives to an Airport Extreme via a USB hub, can I use Time Machine to back one up to the other? I've found multiple discussions about how to use an Airport Extreme disk as a Time Machine backup disk, but nothing on this. I want to use one disk as network storage (i.e. use the Airport extreme as a NAS), but I need a backup solution for that disk.

    That's disappointing. I actually have a separate NAS already, configured for RAID1: a ZyXEL NSA220. Worked fine when I only had windows machines, but isn't reliable with my MACs, and doesn't support extended journaled format, so I need a different solution. I was hoping to just use a USB drive attached to my airport extreme to replace it, but I can't do that if I can't back up that USB drive.
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  • Can I connect a 4 TB USB drive to the airport extreme and use it as a network drive for Time Machine

    Can I connect a 4 TB USB drive to the airport extreme and use it as a network drive for Time Machine

    Yes, if the drive is formatted in Mac OS Extended (Journaled).
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  • Apple TV to access photos and music from drive attached to airport extreme

    I have photos and music stored on external drive attached to Airport extreme. I would like to access them from my Apple TV. I know that I can store them on a computer using iTunes but I do not want to keep the computer on.
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    No. The Apple TV will ignore it.
    (61807)

  • I can't see hard drive attached to Airport extreme from Windows XP computer

    I have a Windows XP computer on my network. I can no longer see the network hard drive attached to Airport Extreme from the XP computer. I can see it with all the MACs on my network and all the Windows 7 computers. I can connect to the internet with the Windows XP computer. I previously had no problem seeing the network hard drive attached to the airport extreme from the XP computer and one day it just disappeared. I have deleted and reinstalled Bonjour, not just Bonjour print services. I can print to a network printer that is not attached to the Airport Extreme. Help!

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    $2500 for a computer that can't connect to a network drive that can be seen by an $500 Dell laptop?
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  • Terabyte USB drive connected to airport extreme not found by time machine

    I attached a USB self powered hub to my airport extreme and attached to it my printer and 1 terabyte external drive.
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    Need step by step directions. Thanks in advance.

    1. Open AirPort Utility (Applications-->Utilities)
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    3. Click Manual Setup
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  • Can Time Machine backup a USB drive connected to Airport Extreme?

    Hi all,
    I have an airport extreme that I used to run a shared USB drive for the family. I have a network drive attached to the airport extreme which I used for Time Machine backups, how do I tell Time Machine to back up the USB drive also?
    All help very gratefully recieved.

    Thanks for your reply,
    When I open Time Machine preferences I can either select a different disk to use as the backup disk or exclude items from the back up. I cannot find an option to add the USB drive attached to my airport extreme. Apologies if I am being a little dumb.

  • Don't see files on USB Drive connected to Airport Extreme

    I just connected an external drive to my Airport Extreme via USB. It appears as a shared device in the finder sidebar. When I select it, none of the files that reside on the drive appear. It is a 1TB drive with 600GB of files on it, but none of the files show up, only a folder with the drive name. I open the folder and it is empty. The folder window shows 300 GB available. How do I make the existing files visible?

    Thanks for the info.
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    Message was edited by: Bob Timmons

  • Can't Delete Files on USB Drive Connected to Airport Extreme

    I'm trying to delete some files on a USB drive connected to my Airport Extreme, but I keep getting a error message that I don't have sufficient privileges to do so. I've tried super deletion applications like FileXaminer, without any success. What other methods are there?

    Thanks for the info.
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    Even if the drive has it's own power supply, a powered USB hub is usually needed on the AirPort Extreme because the power at the USB port is quite limited.
    Message was edited by: Bob Timmons

  • Time Machine doesnt see my USB drive, connected to Airport extreme =(

    Hello,
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    Well this has worked for me. I have a Freecom 500Gb usb hard Drive connected through an unpowered 4-way USBhub to an Airport Extreme Base station. After mounting the Air Disk hard drive on my powerbook, I then dragged the disk to my user folder, thereby creating an alias. I have put that alias in my login items and now TimeMachine works beautifully. I've repeated it on a Mac Mini (also using OSX 10.5.5) and that seems to be fine too. Admittedly the back-ups take a long time over airport, but fine via Ethernet.
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  • Can Time Machine backup USB Drive connected to Airport Extreme Base Station

    I need a new N based wireless router. I would prefer to get just the $179 Base Station and not the $299 Time Capsule. I already have a nice external USB 500GB drive that I would connect to the AEBS. So, once I have this new wireless router/base station installed at home and I have the external USB drive connected to it, can my new Macbook Air with a USB connected 400GB drive be used to backup what is on the Macbook Air and also backup the 500GB USB drive info that is connected to the extreme base station?
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    I found this when searching Apple's web site but it is old, October 2007, and said it could not be done. Has this changed since then?
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    Mac OS X 10.5: Time Machine doesn't back up to AirPort Disks
    * Last Modified on: October 26, 2007
    * Article: 306833
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    Hi all,
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    My last response was incorrect. The base station is in the finder window, under "Shared." I click on that and then I see the USB driver. Also, I went to finder prefs and clicked to show servers on the desktop. So now the USB drive connected to the base station shows up on my desktop. But I still can't search it.
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