AC86U USB Drives not recognized & Time Machine not working

[Wilson828]

I'm a novice at routers. I bought this router based upon reviews and the fact that they advertise that you can use if for Mac Time Machine backups.

I've contact ASUS and while they are very nice - they're not at all helpful. They don't seem to grasp the nature of the problem.

I have two portable USB drives that I've plugged into router.

One of the drives I want to use for Mac Time Machine backups. No matter what I do Time Machine always claims it can't find the disk.

The other drive I store movies on it. At one point it was working fine and I was able to stream wirelessly (always wireless operation for me) via the Plex app. My only complaint about this setup at the time was that the drive never went to sleep. But that's a moot point now that the drive has disappeared. I've rebooted the router, I've removed and plugged back in the usb drives.

I'm just lost with this ... can anyone help me? Thanks in advance.

 

[ApexRon]

I'm a novice at routers. I bought this router based upon reviews and the fact that they advertise that you can use if for Mac Time Machine backups.

I've contact ASUS and while they are very nice - they're not at all helpful. They don't seem to grasp the nature of the problem.

I have two portable USB drives that I've plugged into router.

One of the drives I want to use for Mac Time Machine backups. No matter what I do Time Machine always claims it can't find the disk.

The other drive I store movies on it. At one point it was working fine and I was able to stream wirelessly (always wireless operation for me) via the Plex app. My only complaint about this setup at the time was that the drive never went to sleep. But that's a moot point now that the drive has disappeared. I've rebooted the router, I've removed and plugged back in the usb drives.

I'm just lost with this ... can anyone help me? Thanks in advance.

I have same Time Machine issue and currently working with ASUS to resolve.

 

[bbunge]

I'm a novice at routers. I bought this router based upon reviews and the fact that they advertise that you can use if for Mac Time Machine backups.

I've contact ASUS and while they are very nice - they're not at all helpful. They don't seem to grasp the nature of the problem.

I have two portable USB drives that I've plugged into router.

One of the drives I want to use for Mac Time Machine backups. No matter what I do Time Machine always claims it can't find the disk.

The other drive I store movies on it. At one point it was working fine and I was able to stream wirelessly (always wireless operation for me) via the Plex app. My only complaint about this setup at the time was that the drive never went to sleep. But that's a moot point now that the drive has disappeared. I've rebooted the router, I've removed and plugged back in the usb drives.

I'm just lost with this ... can anyone help me? Thanks in advance.

Do your USB drives have a power supply? If not they should! Thumb drives are OK. To avoid buying new drives you can use a powered USB hub.

Sent from my P01M using Tapatalk

 

[Revelstone77]

This may be a silly question, but have you plugged your movie drive into a computer to verify that the drive itself didn’t fail?

 

[ApexRon]

When I Telnet to my ASUS RT-AC86U I can actually list and view the files on my USB hard drive. So I know that the hard drive has adequate power and that the router can understand the hard drive format. ASUS Time Machine appears to be having issues at the AFP level.

 

[GuruGuy]

I'm a novice at routers. I bought this router based upon reviews and the fact that they advertise that you can use if for Mac Time Machine backups.

I've contact ASUS and while they are very nice - they're not at all helpful. They don't seem to grasp the nature of the problem.

I have two portable USB drives that I've plugged into router.

One of the drives I want to use for Mac Time Machine backups. No matter what I do Time Machine always claims it can't find the disk.

The other drive I store movies on it. At one point it was working fine and I was able to stream wirelessly (always wireless operation for me) via the Plex app. My only complaint about this setup at the time was that the drive never went to sleep. But that's a moot point now that the drive has disappeared. I've rebooted the router, I've removed and plugged back in the usb drives.

I'm just lost with this ... can anyone help me? Thanks in advance.

From everything I've been reading about external drives and using them via usb on the Asus router, they must be formatted as fat32. I've been testing external drives with mine and a formatted drive with ExFat can be seen in the router usb settings but can't be navigated to. Format to Fat32 and then place the same two files on the drive and it can be seen from within the router gui and also from within the computer network.

I find this to be totally ridiculous since Fat32 doesn't support more than 4gb files and I have a sh*t load of them so I can't format a drive and use it with the router.

 

[ApexRon]

I have provided Asus with additional observations which I will share but still no fix, even with the July release.

As I have stated already, there is no formatting issue with the hard drive and I can access the hard drive and its files using telnet.

After I installed the recent firmware update I decided to take a step by step approach:

1. With no USB hard drive physically attached, I enabled Time Machine on the Asus RT-AC86U and applied. No unusual entries in the System Log.
2. I plugged in a properly formatted USB hard drive and the System Log flooded with "... cnid_metad[1346]: error in accept: Socket operation on non-socket" entries.

From my perspective, these entries may be the indication of a socket issue. With my MacBook on the network and a USB hard drive plugged in, MacOS sees the following:

_adisk._tcp. (Automatic Disk Discovery) - 2 items

AirPort Extreme
RT-AC86U-A2E0

RT-AC86U-A2E0.local.
192.168.64.1:9
dk0=adVN=Backups.backupdb,adVF=0x81​

_afpovertcp._tcp. (AFP over TCP) - 2 items

AirPort Extreme
RT-AC86U-A2E0

RT-AC86U-A2E0.local.
192.168.64.1:548​

_device-info._tcp. (Device Info) - 1 item

RT-AC86U-A2E0

RT-AC86U-A2E0.local.
192.168.64.1:0
model=Xserve​

Conclusion, it looks like the Asus is on the network with the right sockets but something is wrong internally to the Asus firmware.

 

[ApexRon]

From everything I've been reading about external drives and using them via usb on the Asus router, they must be formatted as fat32. I've been testing external drives with mine and a formatted drive with ExFat can be seen in the router usb settings but can't be navigated to. Format to Fat32 and then place the same two files on the drive and it can be seen from within the router gui and also from within the computer network.

I find this to be totally ridiculous since Fat32 doesn't support more than 4gb files and I have a sh*t load of them so I can't format a drive and use it with the router.

See my update for today.

 

[GuruGuy]

I have provided Asus with additional observations which I will share but still no fix, even with the July release.

As I have stated already, there is no formatting issue with the hard drive and I can access the hard drive and its files using telnet.

After I installed the recent firmware update I decided to take a step by step approach:

1. With no USB hard drive physically attached, I enabled Time Machine on the Asus RT-AC86U and applied. No unusual entries in the System Log.
2. I plugged in a properly formatted USB hard drive and the System Log flooded with "... cnid_metad[1346]: error in accept: Socket operation on non-socket" entries.

From my perspective, these entries may be the indication of a socket issue. With my MacBook on the network and a USB hard drive plugged in, MacOS sees the following:

_adisk._tcp. (Automatic Disk Discovery) - 2 items

AirPort Extreme
RT-AC86U-A2E0

RT-AC86U-A2E0.local.
192.168.64.1:9
dk0=adVN=Backups.backupdb,adVF=0x81​

_afpovertcp._tcp. (AFP over TCP) - 2 items

AirPort Extreme
RT-AC86U-A2E0

RT-AC86U-A2E0.local.
192.168.64.1:548​

_device-info._tcp. (Device Info) - 1 item

RT-AC86U-A2E0

RT-AC86U-A2E0.local.
192.168.64.1:0
model=Xserve​

Conclusion, it looks like the Asus is on the network with the right sockets but something is wrong internally to the Asus firmware.

You keep saying properly formatted drive but don't say what that is. Again, it has to be Fat32

 

[ApexRon]

You keep saying properly formatted drive but don't say what that is. Again, it has to be Fat32

I have tried Fat32, as well as the other two format options available on the Asus router, and have the same failure.

I am opting for "Mac OS Extended (Journalized)", which is HFS+. The Asus router is a Linux operating system and has no problem with the format I have chosen. In fact, I formatted the hard drive on my MacBook, plugged it into USB port of the router and the router firmware promptly added folders, so I know it can write to the hard drive as well.

 

[GuruGuy]

I have tried Fat32, as well as the other two format options available on the Asus router, and have the same failure.

I am opting for "Mac OS Extended (Journalized)", which is HFS+. The Asus router is a Linux operating system and has no problem with the format I have chosen. In fact, I formatted the hard drive on my MacBook, plugged it into USB port of the router and the router firmware promptly added folders, so I know it can write to the hard drive as well.

Well everything I've read says it has to be Fat32 so not sure where you're seeing it'll work with other formats. I haven't been able to get it to successfully work with anything other than Fat32 and have tried other formats as well, including the Mac OS extended journaled as you have.

I'll give it another shot and see if it works for me.

 

[ApexRon]

Well everything I've read says it has to be Fat32 so not sure where you're seeing it'll work with other formats. I haven't been able to get it to successfully work with anything other than Fat32 and have tried other formats as well, including the Mac OS extended journaled as you have.

Technical information from Asus is extremely lacking.

With a USB drive plugged in, go to the "Network Map" tab and select the USB circle. (This is from memory, so...) A new frame should open on the right of your screen and the right tab at the top of the frame will allow you to format the drive. Please note the format options. In my opinion, if the router doesn't support it don't offer it as a user option.

 

[sfx2000]

Technical information from Asus is extremely lacking.

With a USB drive plugged in, go to the "Network Map" tab and select the USB circle. (This is from memory, so...) A new frame should open on the right of your screen and the right tab at the top of the frame will allow you to format the drive. Please note the format options. In my opinion, if the router doesn't support it don't offer it as a user option.

Look for an older TimeCapsule on eBay/Craigslist/etc - the 4th Gen are pretty solid - turn off the WiFi (or use it, it's not that bad) and replace the 1GB drive with something a bit newer - 4GB seems to be the top there...

 

[ApexRon]

Look for an older TimeCapsule on eBay/Craigslist/etc - the 4th Gen are pretty solid - turn off the WiFi (or use it, it's not that bad) and replace the 1GB drive with something a bit newer - 4GB seems to be the top there...

I am currently using my Apple AirPort Extreme for backing up to the same 1TB USB hard drive. The backups use less than 11% of that 1TB. The Asus router has no issue with my USB hard drive.

 

[ApexRon]

Just received an email from ASUS. They confirmed that there is a bug with Time Machine and that it will be resolved in the next firmware release. I asked for an approximate target date on that release.

 

[KurtK9]

Just received an email from ASUS. They confirmed that there is a bug with Time Machine and that it will be resolved in the next firmware release. I asked for an approximate target date on that release.

I just found this thread via Google when trying for something like the 10th time to get a hard drive to work with my Mac and Asus RT-AC86U. I've also been in touch with Asus and gotten nowhere. I've tried both a 4 TB and a 5 TB drive and can never get past the "OSStatus Error 2" when trying to connect to the drive. I also can view the drive via the Finder, but can't get Time Machine to work.

I assume the new version of the firmware they mentioned is not Version 3.0.0.4.384.21140? I tried that with no luck tonight, but it's been a couple weeks since I attempted to get this thing working...

I'll also respond to my last tech support email and see if I can get any update...

 

[ApexRon]

I just found this thread via Google when trying for something like the 10th time to get a hard drive to work with my Mac and Asus RT-AC86U. I've also been in touch with Asus and gotten nowhere. I've tried both a 4 TB and a 5 TB drive and can never get past the "OSStatus Error 2" when trying to connect to the drive. I also can view the drive via the Finder, but can't get Time Machine to work.

I assume the new version of the firmware they mentioned is not Version 3.0.0.4.384.21140? I tried that with no luck tonight, but it's been a couple weeks since I attempted to get this thing working...

I'll also respond to my last tech support email and see if I can get any update...

You are correct, the Time Machine fix has not been released. Not sure what their criteria is for new releases but they told me within the next 30 to 60 days. So as late as the end of September though I suspect much sooner than that.

I think their support is in Taiwan so there is a delay in their replies. Also, I think English is their 2nd or 3rd language.

 

[Grisu]

they promised so much in the past and never delivered or not in time, just forget it and be happy if you once get it anyway.

 

[raduray]

I have an AC68P which has a USB HD connected to it set up as my Time Machine destination. I formatted using Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format using Disk Utility on my Macbook Pro before mounting it onto the Asus Router. Works fine.

 

[ApexRon]

raduray, hardware used on each model router will determine which firmware is used. Were I a manufacturer, I would build common code to support a particular cpu class and then just compile different versions to support different models. ASUS chose some variation of Linux for my model and probably yours too but for mine ASUS messed up something associated with AFP which prevents my Mac’s Time Machine from connecting to ASUS’s Time Machine.