Airport Extreme Teardown: Hack This Router With Your Own Hard Drive

Apple announced a new Airport Extreme earlier this week, and iFixit has already torn it apart. The good news? It's a hacker's dream.

Instead of opting for a new, custom case for the new router, Apple has opted to just reuse the case of its Time Capsule—just with the hard drive and connectors ripped out. That means there's a gaping 3.5 inch drive-shaped void on the inside, just waiting to be filled.

The iFixit teardown reveals that the SATA/power connectors required to use a drive are absent on the device they ripped apart. But no matter: if you feel so inclined, you could use the USB port and wire a bus-powered 2.5 inch hard drive around inside the case, as 9to5mac points out. Voila, a Time Capsule on a budget. Kinda. [iFixit]