Does Apple TV store media on hard drive?

This might be a stupid question, but I bought Apple TV about a year ago and highly recommend it. I use it in my basement entertainment center and initially used the wireless connection to connect to my Itunes, download movies, etc. I was unhappy with how long it took to download movies via the wireless connection, so I put in the effort to hard wire it via the ethernet cable to my computer, which is on an upper level of my house. Last week my computer had a fatal crash (I am now buying an IMac), but I was surprised that I could still use the Apple TV to listen to my music. I had assumed the Apple TV needed a "host" computer that was running Itunes to operate, but it apparently doesn't. My question is - Does this mean once the Apple TV syncs with the host computer it stores all media (songs, pics, etc.) on the hard drive?

Thanks for any feedback

Unless you tell it not to, the ATV will sync your content from your iTunes library and copy it to the HDD.