Time Capsule vs Airport Extreme as Main Router?

[Keyser Soze]

Hi there. Am reasonably new to all this mac stuff!
Was wondering if you guys could help me out please.

I have the current config at the moment :-

TC as my main router connected to my ISP's DSL modem in the Living Room.

I bought the TC to replace my Airport Extreme as I wanted the backup function of TC. My Airport Extreme has been in the cupboard for a few months now.
Just renovated my apartment and have run CAT6 cable through out.
As my apartment is all concrete, the wireless is not getting to all rooms of my pad with good signal strength, so have decided to try and connect the Airport Extreme in my Bedroom to TC via the CAT6 Ethernet cables. Seems to be working okay.

Have read a few posts where others have the Airport Extreme connected to their ISP's modem, and the TC then connected to the Extreme via wireless or ethernet. Obviously ethernet is faster and more reliable.

My question is, which (TC or Airport Extreme) should I have connected to my ISP's modem, and does it matter?
Could you also please provide me with some settings inside Airport Utility so that I'm not wasting bandwidth and have the TC and AE connected correctly? I still wish to use the Ethernet function to connect TC and AE together, and then use the wireless function of AE in my Bedroom so I can sit on the bed with the laptop wirelessly.

Thx very much in advance!

Keyser

[mmkerc]

Great question, to which I do not have the answer, someone with more networking savvy wil need to address.

I can tell you the Time Capsule is basically an Aipoort Extreme with a hard drive so my guess would be it does not matter the order that you have it connected.

As to your other question of optimizing the network setting for the fastest connection never thought about it. Hope someone can provide some input

[mrcqm]

Like mmkerc I do not believe it truly matters which way you connect them. Both methods will result in the same functionality.

I can think of two factors that would make me lean more towards this setup:
external world <--> AE <--> Time Capsule

1) Traffic between your computer and the hard drive in the Time Capsule is going to be a significant portion of your network traffic. Remove one hop from that traffic and let your computer talk directly to the Time Capsule.

2) Perhaps it makes sense to isolate your backups behind the externally facing router. That would be a paranoid extra step that is probably completely unnecessary but since you have the choice, maybe it makes sense to do so.

[Keyser Soze]

Thx very much for your advice guys. Have done what you suggested and gone for "external world <--> AE <--> Time Capsule".
Still need a little help though on Airport Utility settings.
For the AE, I have the Wireless Mode as "Create a Wireless Network", and a check/tick in the box "Allow this network to be extended".
But for the TC, I'm not sure what to set up for it's Wireless Mode. I'm not even sure that it is "piggy backing" off the AE via ethernet and not Wireless.

Any suggestions?

Thx again.

Keyser

[peteman]

piggybacking off of the ae through ethernet would be a good way to go for speed and reliability. all routers when connected together are better of doing so hardwired to each other where one acts as router and others configured as switches, and done right no problems and can identify easily which router goofs off.

[JRTakoba]

Hello. I have a Time Capsule that I have been using for about 2-3 years. Somewhere along the line it has ceased functioning as a hard disc backup but still works fine as a wireless router. I'm pretty sure that the reason has something to dot with the fact that I neglected to do a Firmware Update sometime and eventually the firmware update message stopped appearing on my desktop and the time capsule icon also disappeared permanently as well.
Is there any way to fix this problem? Is it necessary and, if so, possible to update the firmware for my Time Capsule?

Any help would be much appreciated. Cheers.