Replacement for Apple AirPort Time Capsule for backup

December 14, 2024 11:55 AM

My old AirPort Time Capsule recently gave up the ghost, and Apple long ago stopped producing new ones, so I'm looking for an alternative to back up my data. I liked it because it was dead-simple. I don't need fancy bells and whistles, and ideally I'd like to buy something that's just plug and play, rather than some fancy network-attached storage device that requires me to separately purchase hard drives. I'm on Mac in case that makes a difference. Thanks for any ideas!
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell to Computers & Internet (6 answers total)

There was some discussion of this topic a few months ago here.

One option mentioned in that discussion was the Synology BeeStation, which is their new consumer-level device. I can't tell whether it supports Apple's Time Machine protocol, but it might still be a good backup solution.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 12:20 PM on December 14, 2024 [2 favorites]

I have a basic USB hard drive that I plug into my Mac regularly and Time Machine backs up to it automatically as soon as it plugs in. I have this one but I’m sure you could find something smaller or cheaper or both if that meets your needs better.
posted by MadamM at 12:31 PM on December 14, 2024 [4 favorites]

Time Machine will do a scheduled back-up to any external drive, so that would be the easiest solution, I think.
posted by Thorzdad at 6:08 AM on December 15, 2024

Response by poster: Thanks for the link to that recent thread! Wild that a simple solution doesn't really exist. I may just wind up buying an old Time Capsule on eBay.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 3:23 PM on December 15, 2024

I should add: after making my comments in the previous thread, I got my Time Machine backups working on my Synology device again. It wasn't that bad. And shortly after my computer stolen, so it's lucky I did have them working. I was able to restore successfully from the Synology device. The restore had to run overnight, even connected by ethernet. But it did work and I didn't lose anything. So if you're willing to put some tinkering into it, Synology can be a good solution. But not as easy as a Time Capsule.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 8:33 PM on December 15, 2024

There are a few routes depending on how valuable your data and how much you want to think about it.

The Synology Bee Station mentioned by Winnie the Proust does support time machine. A 4TB system will cost you $220 or so. See https://kb.synology.com/vi-vn/BeeStation/tutorial/BeeStation_backup_Mac_Time_Machine for setup instructions. The BeeStation also has the BeeProtect option for $60/yr that will backup your BeeStation to Synology's cloud for an offsite copy of your backup data (highly recommended if your data is important to you).

If you want easy and don't want to muck with local hardware or the associated upfront cost, look at cloud backup providers like Backblaze: https://www.backblaze.com/cloud-backup/personal/mac-online-backup It is $9/mo per system.

If you have a lot of data or want to go mass overkill route, I have a setup where my mac (and PC) devices backup to a local Synology DS923+ with a pair of mirrored 12TB drives. This system is then backed up to the Backblaze B2 cloud storage. It provides me with a NAS devices to use for a data "archive" to free up space on my local hard drives in addition to a spot to store TimeMachine backups. Both the backups and archive are are then backed up to the Backblaze B2 cloud storage platform so that I have an offsite copy in case the house burns down and takes my desktop, laptop, and synology with it.
posted by SegFaultCoreDump at 9:37 AM on December 16, 2024 [1 favorite]