Wireless backup

I have a number of Apple devices and am looking for an alternative to backing up to an external hard drive connected by cable.

I was considering the Airport Time Capsule and this seems to fit the bill, except that it is also a router which I would not be looking to use. I asked Apple support whether I could use the Capsule purely as a backup device and after a pause, the guy I was talking to from Apple said no.

Searching the web I find that people have done what I'm looking to do, with the capsule, but all the posts I have found are three or four years old.

Does anyone know if I can use the Capsule as I intend, or is it a No No? If it is yes how do I set it up (as I said the posts I saw were a few years old and I presume the layout of the various apps that make it work, have changed?

If no can anyone suggest an alternative, wireless backup device please?

Thanks

You probably should give the TC a miss and look for something else. Apple has gotten out of the TC and router business although they still support those models. The point is that they're getting old. I'm not particularily in favor of wireless backups as they can be unreliable if everything is not working exactly as it should. That's just my opinion.

Simply put, wired backups work and are faster than wireless and much less expensive. ;D

Thanks

There are some routers which will support wireless backup by attaching a hard drive to the router. I can think of at least two things to watch out for if you go that route:

1. Make sure that the USB port on the router can be used with a hard drive. I Think there are some routers where the USB port is basically for maintenance only.
2. If you are planning to use Time Machine as the backup program pay attention to which drive formats are supported when attached to the router.

You might find this article useful. It lists several routers that should work for your purposes.

Thanks- my router doesn’t support that.
Looks like it’s the wired option then.

Looks like it’s the wired option then.

Click to expand...

By far the best option.

Ian

I still use the wired option myself and as stated it us the mist reliable but it's worth bearing in mind that iTunes and my choice iMazing both offer wireless syncing over WiFi when the device is locked, plugged into power and on the same network as your computer. Of course this means the sync is to your computer not an external drive and the computer needs to be on. To overcome that issue I also backup my idevices to iCloud. This happens at night and is a valuable step for those that use their devices as stand alone. I recently setup a brand new iPad for a friend without a computer by initiating an icloud backup on her old device then restoring that backup to her new device.
So it all depends on what you propose to use your backup for. Content management is one aspect backup is another.