I have a 2TB TimeCapsule (TC), about 8 years old, I’ve been using for TimeMachine ™. Since I got my eero mesh, the TC is no longer my router, but connected via ethernet to the eero it’s still my Time Machine, which backs up 2 Macs, my wife’s and mine (which is why it has to be connected to our home network, not wired to one of the Macs). Over the past couple of years TM has been buggy (never was 100% reliable, but still usually helpful). My backups occasionally need to start all over (and the past gets lost), but my wife’s, on the same disk, have had no such problem. I suspect it’s no-longer-young disk is becoming worn in the place where my backups reside - though it might be a software problem on my Mac.
2 Q’s:
- I’d like to check the health of the TC’s disk, but I haven’t found any way to do that, using, for instance, TechTool Pro or somesuch. I’ve tried to connect it via ethernet to my Mac, but it doesn’t mount on the desktop nor is it registered by Disk Utility. Is there a way?
- If I simply assume the TC’s disk has become faulty (though, curiously, only on my backups, not my wife’s) and I replace it with something else to use as TM, what is best to use? Do I need an NAS device, or will a simple external HD (which needs an ethernet port so I can connect it to the eero, which has no USB port) work?
I’m not sufficiently tech-savvy to sort all this out, and would appreciate any help/advice.