Vobs on a mac mini

I am considering purchasing a mac mini as a part of a media center plan. I have some home movies that I have recorded in DVD format (i.e .ifo & .vob etc) stored on the network and I was wondering whether I could play these (without converting to another format) through a mac mini. This would preferably be through Front Row & Bonjour.

The movies are stored on a windows file server if this makes any difference, though from some research it appears it probably wouldn't be.

Many thanks for any response.

I think its possible. You'd probably have to install iTunes on your Windows Server and load the DVD movies onto your iTunes playlist (in a compatible format, of course), then share the movies on your network through iTunes.

iTV will probably be a better option once it comes out.

I think I've found the answer. I was looking for an excuse to buy a Mac, but that sounds too much like a fudge of a solution for my liking.

Did you finish reading the comments? There's a very neat apple script to do exactly what you want:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=714917

Doesn't seem like nearly as much of a fudge as the main article. Just thought I'd point it out in case you'd missed it...

If that's the only excuse you can think of to buy a Mac, perhaps it wouldn't suit you though - there's a lot more reasons than being able to play a DVD image

Jem said:

Did you finish reading the comments? There's a very neat apple script to do exactly what you want:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=714917

Doesn't seem like nearly as much of a fudge as the main article. Just thought I'd point it out in case you'd missed it...

If that's the only excuse you can think of to buy a Mac, perhaps it wouldn't suit you though - there's a lot more reasons than being able to play a DVD image

Click to expand...

You're right I did miss that, and watching the movie on this site, it does seem like it could be done fairly seemlessly. Unfortunately it does seem to kill Front Row, so on ending the movie I would have to restart the program, which is not an ideal solution. Yes I know I'm being rather picky,but I kind of want a seemless integration.

Regarding my comment about the mac, I know this stuff can be done on a windows/linux box, but I want to try out a mac, and this seemed to be an entry point that I could justify to myself, and my ever watching wife.

Heehee yeah I know the watcher syndrome The only reason I got the iMac was because my Win XP box finally died and refused to boot no matter what I did. So after 10 days of hacking at it I finally gave in and splurged the cash on the iMac... took a bit longer before I let her see the receipt....

I'm sure it wouldn't take a genius to be able to restart Front Row after the movie ended, a tweak here or there will sort it out. If an Apple Script can shut down front row and launch the dvd player, I'm sure it can re-launch front row when the dvd player terminates.

However, reading what's been said in the posting, it appears that it makes no difference that Front Row dies because as soon as you hit the menu button (which is the button you use to get into Front Row anyways) Front Row re-launches and appears seamlessly. You wouldn't have to manually restart it!

So there you go - things on a Mac usually are easier than they appear at first

The only tricky bit now is gonna be the wife....