MacOS overwhelmed turns Time Capsule support

As early as 2018, Apple said goodbye to the business with its own WLAN base stations, some of which could also be used as useful backup devices in the home network. Although there are no longer any updates for serious security gaps, the function of playing time-Machine backups on airport devices was preserved. This will even be the case with MacOS 26 alias Tahoe, which will be released in September. After that, however, it is finally over. This information can be seen from the macOS 26 developer beta, like the X user with the handle @stellafudge has determined.

Info in the MacOS-26 beta

If you still have an old airport router with Airport Disk or Time Capsule, you will be displayed in the Time Machine area in the system settings under MacOS 26. There is now a warning (see picture above): “The next main version of MacOS will no longer support Airport Disk or other time capsule hard drives for time-machine backups.” This is characterized by an exclamation mark and the indication that the medium currently used for backups is “not recommended for backup”.

An existing “more experienced …”-link leads to one Support page for the various backup disk options for Apple’s backup system Time Machine (that remains available). In the “Airport Extreme Base Station or Time Capsule” area, it can be read that “these solutions would no longer be recommended”, even if the group continues to provide information on how this works. “Main version” is obviously meant MacOS 27. That means: Backups on the Apple routers are still possible at least until next autumn-or as long as you still stay under MacOS 27.

Reason: change of the protocol

The main reason for the end of the support of the old router is the fact that Apple takes its old file part protocol Apple File Protocol (AFP) out of support. For years the group has preferred SMB instead. However, the airport systems only support AFP. Accordingly, it can be assumed that the support for AFP with MacOS 27 finally ends. MacOS 27 is also the first Apple operating system that only runs with Apple-Silicon machines, and Intel-Mac’s support then ends.

Both the Airport Extreme-Base station with 802.11ac (has Disk) and the Router Airport Time Capsule are affected by the Time Machine measure, the latter was on the market until 2018 as mentioned. The devices are still popular and sometimes achieve high prices on ebay. However, you should no longer use them because Apple no longer delivers security updates. It is unclear whether the group will ever offer routers again.