By: dormammu (18-Jun-08)      Experience with product: 2 Months

Strengths:	802.11n wireless router can also handle 2.4 GHz 802.11b/g or 5 GHz 802.11a. Time Machine support.
Weaknesses:	None feature-wise.

Full User Summary
Time Capsule is, in essence, an 802.11n AirPort Extreme Base Station with a built-in NAS hard drive. It is not just for Macs.Time Capsule can be used with PCs and Macs as a wireless router, for file sharing (it supports AFP, SMB, and NFS protocols), and for printer sharing.The only Mac-specific feature is being able to use Time Capsule for Time Machine backups, because Time Machine is a Mac OS X Leopard feature.When used for Time Machine backups, there are 2 distinct advantages of using a Time Capsule vs. just attaching a hard drive directly to your Mac:1) Time Capsule can backup multiple Macs independent of each other (if you're on one Mac, and you're backing up to a shared hard drive that's attached to a second Mac, both Macs need to be on for the first Mac to get backed up).2) Time Capsule can archive its Time Machine backups to another hard drive (say, for off-site storage).Also, to clarify what another reviewer mentioned: It's true that Time Machine backups on a Time Capsule are in a different format than Time Machine backups made to a local drive attached directly to your Mac (Time Machine uses sparsebundle disc images when backing up to Time Capsule). However, when you switch your Time Machine backup from one drive to another or to Time Capsule, Time Machine doesn't delete the backups on the original backup drive. As long as you don't erase the original drive, you can always switch back to it to "see" your older backups saved on it. Time Machine can't combine the two set of backups, though, because of the sparsebundle format (this is used to optimize network throughput).

By: gooru (16-Jun-08)      Experience with product: 2

Strengths:	802.11n, fast, compact, convenient, flexible
Weaknesses:	No way to copy over old Time Machine backup, no way to throttle Time Machine, server grade hard drive questionable

Full User Summary
Who knew that backups could be cool? Time Capsule is a slim, sexy device that provides not only Wi-Fi with 802.11n support but also convenient backups via Time Machine, which is built into Leopard (OS X 10.5). This Airport is ridiculously easy to setup and makes life a breeze. It's a truly a device that employs "set it and forget it." There's even a colocation service that will allow you to use Time Capsule remotely, which is just really cool.The problems arise when you're a power user. First, there's no way to copy over a local Time Machine backup. If you've already been using Time Machine with an external hard drive, then you can kiss that backup goodbye when you switch to Time Capsule. This is an absolutely ridiculous oversight on Apple's part and will make or break it for many potential customers. The second problem is the hard drive. According to many sites, it may not actually be server grade despite what Apple claims. Combined with a one-year warranty (AppleCare will apparently extend it to the life of your accompanying Mac, though), this may not be as dependable a backup as you like.In the end, the majority of Apple users will likely love it, especially since the majority are also likely not backing up in the first place, which is the main sticking point. If you're already using Time Machine, then the choice is questionable (I went ahead and bought it anyway). However, if you're not already using Time Machine, then this is an easy choice: buy it already!

By: ziocon (28-Apr-08)      Experience with product: 1 Months

Strengths:	Good Design
Weaknesses:	only for Mac users

Full User Summary
The good: Clean design; good deal for Draft-N router and 500GB or 1TB of storage; low maintenance data backup for Mac users; extensibility via USB port. The bad: Only average networking performance; few advanced storage features beyond backup capabilities, and those only for Mac users.