Suggestions on AC86U with two USB drives

[Aging Amateur]

Based in large part on SNB's review, I just bought an AC86U instead of the Netgear R7000P recommended by Wirecutter. I have mostly Mac devices and I have had Airport Extreme and Time Capsule routers over the years. My most recent router has been a Time Capsule set up as a Time Machine backup drive for one wired iMac and two wireless MacBook Pros, plus a SanDisk SSD plugged into the Time Capsule with a SATA to USB adapter and used as a shared network drive.

I got the AC86U up and working for main and guest networks very easily. Browsing performance seems to be at least as good and maybe snappier than the Time Capsule.

Setting up an enabled Time Machine drive with a Samsung T5 in the USB 3.0 port and a shared network drive using my SanDisk SSD in the USB 2.0 port was a bit trickier. On my first try I thought I had set up both USB drives but only the Time Machine-enabled drive showed up as a connected server in my Macs' Finder windows. The Time Machine-enabled drive seems to be associated with my main router account, since the drive has the router's name in my Finder windows and the router name also shows up in the Device Name window in the top half of the web Network Place (Samba) Share page. When I called the Asus techs to see how I could get the network drive to show up in my Finder windows the Level 1 tech bounced me to Level 2, and the Level 2 tech created a ticket for "the engineers", who never got back to me.

There are only a limited number of settings you can try on the web Network Place (Samba) Share page, so I began trying every permutation I could think of. At one point I got the network drive to show up along with the Time Machine drive when I opened the main account's drive in my Finder window. However, when I clicked on the network drive I got a message that it could not be opened because the original item (or device?) could not be found. I wanted each drive to show up separately in my Finder windows, so I kept tweaking and re-applying the various possible settings. I finally got the drives to show up separately when I set up a separate account for the network drive, typed NetworkDrive into the Device Name window on the top half of the Network Place (Samba) Share page, and highlighted R/W for all of the drive folders in both the main account drive and the NetworkDrive in my router's main account view and in the NetworkDrive account view on the bottom half of the page.

Everything works OK now - I can do automatic wired or wireless Time Machine backups for all of the computers and the NetworkDrive mounts easily on the wired iMac and the two wireless MacBook Pros.

One quirky issue I have now is that in the bottom half of the Network Place (Samba) Share page the router's main account drive (enabled for Time Machine) shows two folders - one for each of the MacBook Pros' sparse bundles. There is no folder for the iMac's sparse bundle, although the iMac does have its own sparse bundle when I open the main account drive. I did not set those folders up and I cannot delete them.

I did set up a folder named Network Drive in the NetworkDrive's account, and it is the only folder that shows up for the NetworkDrive on the bottom half of the Network Place (Samba) Share page. However, when I open the NetworkDrive in my Finder it shows three possible shares that might be mounted - a NetworkDrive folder and the two MacBook Pro sparse bundle folders that show up in the main router account drive. If I mount the two sparse bundle folders I don't get the actual sparse bundles, which is not surprising since they are actually in the main account's Samsung T5 drive. What I get are some information and support files for the sparse bundles but not the actual sparse bundles.

If anyone on the forum knows how to improve my Network Place (Samba) Share settings so that I don't get the sparse bundle folders when I open the NetworkDrive I would be very appreciative! Also, of course, I would appreciate any advice on how to set up my two USB drives "properly" if there is a better way to set them up!

 

[ApexRon]

I have a less complex setup but am running ASUS Time Machine successfully on Merlin firmware after many attempts and versions using ASUS firmware. I have a single MacBook so my backup storage requirements were less than ¼ of my 1TB hard drive. I used the Mac to partition the hard drive and then just plugged into ASUS, configured ASUS Time Machine to use smaller partition and we're good to go. I made the larger partition a network drive for assorted uses on network.

Realize that Merlin is ASUS firmware that is enhanced to a degree but most importantly a working firmware. Consequently, with regard to Time Machine and Samba improvements have been made but not the redesign that is needed. I should state that by redesign, I am primarily referring to the way a USB drive(s) is presented to users both on the ASUS router as well as in file manager of PCs and finder of Macs.

 

[Aging Amateur]

I was able to accomplish the setup I have now with the most recent Asus firmware. I'll probably leave well-enough alone since it seems to be working, for now at least. However, I would definitely appreciate advice from any forum members who have two USB drives set up and working on the AC86U. I suspect there are better ways to set up the drives than the trial and error setup I finally put together, which shows extra sparse bundle shares from the Time Machine-enabled drive on the NetworkDrive in our Macs' Finder windows.

I use Carbon Copy Cloner on our Macs to do incremental copies of various files to the NetworkDrive, which serves as a shared file resource for all of our Macs. CCC is able to access the SanDisk NetworkDrive by itself and Time Machine is similarly able to access the Samsung T5 drive. The drives' presentation in the Macs' Finder windows is not as slick as it was with the Time Capsule, but the drives seem to be working fine.

 

[Aging Amateur]

Plea for help on setting up USB drives with the AC86U!

I started this thread last December when I changed our home wifi router from an Apple Time Capsule to the AC86U. In my first post above I explained how I initially used a trial and error approach to set up a Time Machine drive in the 3.0 port and a general use network drive in the 2.0 port. ApexRon posted to explain his single, partitioned drive setup using only the 3.0 port (I assume), with one partition enabled as a Time Machine drive and the other partition enabled as a Network Place (Samba) drive.

As it turns out, I was too quick to boast about my trial and error setup. In my first post I noted how the Time Machine drive seemed to "bleed" a bit into the network drive, showing "false" sparse bundles for my Macs' Time Machine backups in the network drive's server contents listing. This turned into a major problem last week when my AC86U started offering up the network drive instead of the Time Machine drive when my Macs entered the first step of a Time Machine backup, which is labeled as "Looking for backup drive". In this step the Apple Time Machine software tries to connect to the previously selected drive so it can add an incremental versioned backup to each Mac's previously established sparse bundle in that drive. At this step, the AC86U offered the network drive instead of the Time Machine drive, and our Macs flashed a message that "the previously selected drive cannot be found, do you want to select this new drive instead?" - that is not the exact message, but that is the gist of it. I said no, and then re-selected the correct Time Machine drive. The Macs' Time Machine software then did its normal incremental backup ups, in the correct drive, but it put the backups in new sparse bundles with each Mac's regular name fiollowd by a 1, so I now have sparse bundles named "Dads Mac" and "Dads Mac 1", and "Moms Mac" and "Moms Mac 1".

As before, the names of these sparse bundles also show up in the contents listing for the network drive server, but they are actually false sparse bundles that cannot be opened from the network drive's server window. Only the "networkdrive" can be opened, and it seems to work fine when it does open, except that sometimes, under circumstances I cannot isolate or reliably duplicate, I get a message that "the networkdrive cannot be opened because the original item cannot be found". Please note, I call this drive my network drive, but the only name Asus seems to accept for the server is "networkdrive".

I have called Asus about this problem and the Level 1 techs have no explanation. Instead of bouncing my problems to "the engineers" as before, who never got back to me, Asus now has a Wireless Feedback Form that asks a detailed set of questions about a router's problems and settings. It is a very thorough form and it takes a long time to fill it out. I did fill it out and submit it; I am waiting to see if Asus ever gets back to me.

In the meantime, it would be GREAT if anyone on this forum has any helpful suggestions on how to set up two stable USB drives on the AC86U, with the 3.0 port enabled as a Time Machine drive and the 2.0 port enabled as a general use network drive.

 

[ApexRon]

Plea for help on setting up USB drives with the AC86U!

I started this thread last December when I changed our home wifi router from an Apple Time Capsule to the AC86U. In my first post above I explained how I initially used a trial and error approach to set up a Time Machine drive in the 3.0 port and a general use network drive in the 2.0 port. ApexRon posted to explain his single, partitioned drive setup using only the 3.0 port (I assume), with one partition enabled as a Time Machine drive and the other partition enabled as a Network Place (Samba) drive.

As it turns out, I was too quick to boast about my trial and error setup. In my first post I noted how the Time Machine drive seemed to "bleed" a bit Ito the network drive, showing "false" sparse bundles for my Macs' Time Machine backups in the network drive's server contents listing. This turned into a major problem last week when my AC86U started offering up the network drive instead of the Time Machine drive when my Macs entered the first step of a Time Machine backup, which is labeled as "Looking for backup drive". In this step the Apple Time Machine software tries to connect to the previously selected drive so it can add an incremental versioned backup to each Mac's previously established sparse bundle in that drive. At this step, the AC86U offered the network drive instead of the Time Machine drive, and our Macs flashed a message that "the previously selected drive cannot be found, do you want to select this new drive instead?" - that is not the exact message, but that is the gist of it. I said no, and then re-selected the correct Time Machine drive. The Macs' Time Machine software then did its normal incremental backup ups, in the correct drive, but it put the backups in new sparse bundles with each Mac's regular name fiollowd by a 1, so I now have sparse bundles named "Dads Mac" and "Dads Mac 1", and "Moms Mac" and "Moms Mac 1".

As before, the names of these sparse bundles also show up in the contents listing for the network drive server, but they are actually false sparse bundles that cannot be opened from the network drive's server window. Only the "networkdrive" can be opened, and it seems to work fine when it does open, except that sometimes, under circumstances I cannot isolate or reliably duplicate, I get a message that "the networkdrive cannot be opened because the original item cannot be found". Please note, I call this drive my network drive, but the only name Asus seems to accept for the server is "networkdrive".

I have called Asus about this problem and the Level 1 techs have no explanation. Instead of bouncing my problems to "the engineers" as before, who never got back to me, Asus now has a Wireless Feedback Form that asks a detailed set of questions about a routers problems and settings. It is a very thorough form and it takes a long time to fill it out. I did fill it out and submit it; I am waiting to see if Asus ever gets back to me.

In the meantime, it would be GREAT if anyone on this forum has any helpful suggestions on how to set up two stable USB drives on the AC86U, with the 3.0 port enabled as a Time Machine drive and the 2.0 port enabled as a general use network drive.

Since my last update I began having issues similar to what you reported. I contacted ASUS and got tired of their promises so I installed Merlin firmware. Since installing Merlin, I have had no issues with Time Machine. Here is the process I used:

1. Formated 1TB hard drive using MacBook with HPFS+
2. Partitioned hard drive into two 500GB partitions
3. Plugged into USB 3.0 port of ASUS (using USB 3.0)
4. Configured Merlin ASUS as images show

One important lesson I learned. Once you plug a hard drive into the ASUS and set it up, you cannot remove to make modifications to hard drive and then re-plug in and expect it to work.

 

[Aging Amateur]

ApexRon,

Thanks for your post! I have not tried the Merlin software yet, but your post may lead me to try it.

You noted "One important lesson I learned. Once you plug a hard drive into the ASUS and set it up, you cannot remove to make modifications to hard drive and then re-plug in and expect it to work."

I have also learned that if I eject a USB drive from the Asus, then load files into it via a faster, direct connection to my Mac, then plug it back into my Asus, I do NOT get a nice, pre-loaded drive. I just get a drive with less space available, and I am not be able to read or or write to the files I pre-loaded.

 

[ApexRon]

I have also learned that if I eject a USB drive from the Asus, then load files into it via a faster, direct connection to my Mac, then plug it back into my Asus, I do NOT get a nice, pre-loaded drive. I just get a drive with less space available, and I am not be able to read or or write to the files I pre-loaded.

What worked for me is to power off the ASUS, then remove the drive, do whatever, plug back into ASUS and power up.

 

[Aging Amateur]

ApexRon,

Thanks. I'll try that in the future.