Apple Convert: Setting up home media network

Hey everyone.

I am a very recent Apple Convert, and I havbe to say, I am very happy so far.

For the last couple of years I have, very happily, been using a Windows Media Centre.

Now that I am in Apple land I want to know if I can alter my setup.

I currently own a MacBook Pro and a Vaio Vista PC.

What I would like to do is buy a big external hard drive and Apple TV and use this as the source of my home entertainment centre.

Can I store all my media content (music, a LOT of DVD rips and photos) on this system so they are accessible on my TV and then just sync a subset of these to my MBP so that I can take part of the library away to work or on holiday with me?

Other things that I would like to be able to do would be:

- Access the content over the internet on a PC or Mac
- Watch/record/pause Live Sky TV like I did in my Media Centre.
- Watch rented movies on my main TV

Now, I know the last one is not possible yet, but what is the situation with this? Are there any plans to enable live TV? It seems strange that the ohly thing apple TV doesn't do is TV!! Is it worth buying now, or waiting for AppleTV 2?

With the big external hard drive, can I get away with the smaller Apple TV Hard drive and pull the content straight off the 1TB external storage? I am thinking of the Time Capsual to use for backup and media storage. Can these be daisy chained to increase storage?

I currently use EyeTV on my MBP, is there any way to integrate this? I guess I could have a Mac Mini or something to record all the programs I want straight to the external Hard Drive, but this would also be limited to rubbish Freeview and not sky TV.

I would have all the above connected through ethernet and then the laptops accessing the content over the wireless.

I would love to hear how other people have set up similar systems and how likely my desired system is.

There are a lot of thoughts and questions here.. so appologies if it is too much... just a bit of a brain dump.

Thanks

Mark

ill try and answer your questions as best as i can. im new to the apple tv but have figured most of it out.
-first off, my current setup is what you would like to buy. i have an external HD hooked up to my macbook and it stores all my music and movies. i always leave it plugged into my laptop so i can play my music through itunes.

-you can sync selected items onto the apple tv from your external HD. or, you can stream your media from your itunes library, just have to have itunes running obviously.

-i am not sure about the live tv, i havent heard anything about that, but maybe someone else can chime in regarding that.

the apple tv itself wont change, its just going to be a software update. i bought my apple tv a couple days ago and love it, ill probably love it even more after the software update. currently, you cant watch rented movies on the apple tv, only ones you have bought or downloaded onto your itunes.

-you can get away with a smaller apple tv. i only bought the 40 gig because i dont rent too many movies, but i have over 500gigs of media on my external HD, havent had any problems with anything yet.

well, i answered what i could, sorry i couldnt answer all of it though.

Thanks for the reply. Glad you are getting on well with your setup.

When you store the media on your Apple TV and external hard drive do you play it on the Macs through a Shared Library, or does the sync actually copy the files down to the Mac... so that I can sync a subset of the media to my MacBook and take it out on the road with me?

Cheers

Mark

heftylefty said:

ill try and answer your questions as best as i can. im new to the apple tv but have figured most of it out.
-first off, my current setup is what you would like to buy. i have an external HD hooked up to my macbook and it stores all my music and movies. i always leave it plugged into my laptop so i can play my music through itunes.

-you can sync selected items onto the apple tv from your external HD. or, you can stream your media from your itunes library, just have to have itunes running obviously.

-i am not sure about the live tv, i havent heard anything about that, but maybe someone else can chime in regarding that.

the apple tv itself wont change, its just going to be a software update. i bought my apple tv a couple days ago and love it, ill probably love it even more after the software update. currently, you cant watch rented movies on the apple tv, only ones you have bought or downloaded onto your itunes.

-you can get away with a smaller apple tv. i only bought the 40 gig because i dont rent too many movies, but i have over 500gigs of media on my external HD, havent had any problems with anything yet.

well, i answered what i could, sorry i couldnt answer all of it though.

Click to expand...

I'm not sure I understand your question very well, but...

I keep 250 gigs of media on an external hard drive connected to my MacBook Pro. I leave itunes running almost all the time and stream my media. The only media I have on my apple tv are photos, because I didn't like the flowers screen saver. However, when I plan to go places I always sync it so my content will stay on there when I leave my wireless network.

Not sure if that answered the question or not, but it was worth a try.

--
MacGuy18

Thanks,

Yeah, it seems to be that the way I have heard of it working is to have all the content on the Mac and then stream it TO the Apple TV. I want it to work the other way, so that the content is always on the Apple TV (so it is available at home) and I can have more media than I can store on my laptop.

And I want to stream this FROM the Apple TV to the MacBook, but be able to play some stuff away from my home network.

I hope that makes sense.

Mark

I think you will find that you can sync the ATV from your Macbook, but not the other way round.

S

MarkStokes said:

Thanks,

Yeah, it seems to be that the way I have heard of it working is to have all the content on the Mac and then stream it TO the Apple TV. I want it to work the other way, so that the content is always on the Apple TV (so it is available at home) and I can have more media than I can store on my laptop.

And I want to stream this FROM the Apple TV to the MacBook, but be able to play some stuff away from my home network.

I hope that makes sense.

Mark

Click to expand...

ive never attempted to stream from the ATV to the MB so im not sure if thats entirely possible. i could try and give it a shot

Try

That would be great if youcould try.

It seems very strange that no-one would have thought of that before.

The ATV and external hard drive are the 2 items that are fixed in the house and laptops are moved around. If I am not home, then my family cannot watch or listen to my content.

And I have way too much content to store it all on my laptop, but a big 1TB media server can. And I will never need all that content out on the road.

If the ATV can't act as a media server, then I am affraid I am out and won't be investing (sorry.. I had a Dragons Den-athon at the weekend!!)

Very strange.. Windows Media Centre, I'm coming home.