Airport/ Time Capsule with Ventura 13.2.1

With some good luck, the current settings on the Time Capsule might work with the "main modem" in the house without having to reset the Time Capsule to start all over again from scratch to configure the device.

We won't know how well.....or if.....this will work though until you try it out.

We assume that the Time Capsule is powered off at this time. If it's not, just pull the power cord from the back of the Capsule to power it down.

Connect an Ethernet cable from one of the Ethernet ports on the modem/router......(there are 4 of them on most products)....choose any one that you want, and connect the other end to the "O" Ethernet port on the Time Capsule

Power up the Time Capsule and give it a minute to run

Open AirPort Utility on your MacBook Air.......(Finder > Applications > Utilities > AirPort Utility)

Does the Time Capsule appear? If not, post back for more instructions.

If yes, click on the picture of the Time Capsule, then click Edit in the smaller window that appears.

If the light on the Time Capsule is flashing amber, look for the Status setting in the small window and click on the small amber dot there and post back with the message next to Status.

If the light is green, that is a good sign.

Either way, post back on your progress and we will continue.

The Time Capsule must connect to the network using a permanent wired Ethernet cable connection. It cannot connect using Wi-Fi only.......if that might be what you were asking about.

I am not recommending that you try this, but it might be possible to buy a Wi-Fi extender that has an Ethernet port to connect to the modem/router using Wi-Fi, and then you could connect the Time Capsule to the extender using a short Ethernet cable connection.

Now please refer back to my original response and questions, which are repeated again just below:

Power up the Time Capsule and give it a minute to run

Open AirPort Utility on your MacBook Air.......(Finder > Applications > Utilities > AirPort Utility)

Does the Time Capsule appear? If not, post back for more instructions.

If yes, click on the picture of the Time Capsule, then click Edit in the smaller window that appears.

If the light on the Time Capsule is flashing amber, look for the Status setting in the small window and click on the small amber dot there and post back with the message next to Status.

If the light is green, that is a good sign.

Either way, post back on your progress and we will continue.

Bandwidth is always reduced when you add another device to the network. This is unavoidable. The same would be true if you connected another computer or iPhone / iPad to the network.

But, chances are you will not notice this at all unless your current Internet connection plan with your Internet Service Provider (ISP) is extremely slow. Since the Time Capsule is connected to your network now, do you notice any slow down on the network with your other devices?

If you do not want to add the Time Capsule to the network, then your only other option would be to add a USB hard drive and connect it directly to the MacBook Air when you want to back up the Mac. This will not affect the bandwidth on the network, because the hard drive will be connected to your Mac, not to the network.

With that additional information, my suggestion would be to go with a USB drive to connect directly to your Mac.

Backups will be much simpler and faster this way, with much less to go wrong compared to backups over a network using another person's network. Just connect the hard drive a few times during the week to back up, unless you keep your Mac in a fixed location that would allow the USB to remain connected all the time.

You can hold onto the Time Capsule for possible future use or sell the device on eBay.com