About Apple TV - Or an alternative
Discussion
I've got some money burning a hole in my pocket and I'm considering an Apple TV box - I've a few questions about it really which I was hoping someone might be able to answer:
Can I stream from a NAS to an Apple TV?
I don't have a HDMI TV - is there an adapter for HDMI to SCART or equivalent?
I've noticed, however, that I can't use this to replace my Freeview box - I've got a comedy 1Mb connection at home which is near as useless so the option to rent stuff is neither use nor ornament to me - Is there anything out there that can be a freeview box AND allow streaming? This potentially makes the Apple TV surplus to requirement.
Another random question - is there a freeview box out there that allows you to record to an external device? (Short of buying a whole PC with a TV card, that is...)
Can I stream from a NAS to an Apple TV?
I don't have a HDMI TV - is there an adapter for HDMI to SCART or equivalent?
I've noticed, however, that I can't use this to replace my Freeview box - I've got a comedy 1Mb connection at home which is near as useless so the option to rent stuff is neither use nor ornament to me - Is there anything out there that can be a freeview box AND allow streaming? This potentially makes the Apple TV surplus to requirement.
Another random question - is there a freeview box out there that allows you to record to an external device? (Short of buying a whole PC with a TV card, that is...)
I just got an Apple-TV thing, like you had a bit of cash burning a hole.
I'm pretty sure there is better out there, but I am a big iTunes user and so the option of it just working out of the box was a winner to me, and for £99 (or 80-something off Amazon) it's no great shakes. Can't tell you how well it works yet as I'm waiting on delivery of TV to go with it
I'm pretty sure there is better out there, but I am a big iTunes user and so the option of it just working out of the box was a winner to me, and for £99 (or 80-something off Amazon) it's no great shakes. Can't tell you how well it works yet as I'm waiting on delivery of TV to go with it
If you don't have a TV with HDMI, and don't want to stream stuff, an Apple TV is going to be an ornament only.
Most NAS boxes that indicate they can act as iTunes servers implement something called DAAP. This is fine for music/audio files, but not for video. With Apple TV 2, Apple introduced something called Home Sharing. This is what the ATV2 uses to access content on other devices in your house. At the moment only iTunes itself has Home Sharing support.
In addition, the actual streaming mechanism used is new, and called Airplay. Again, only iTunes and iOS have Airplay support, but Apple are promising to open this up further and it has already been hacked to work in various other ways.
The long and the short of it is that you need to have iTunes itself running in order for the Apple TV 2 to be able to access your media.
Most NAS boxes that indicate they can act as iTunes servers implement something called DAAP. This is fine for music/audio files, but not for video. With Apple TV 2, Apple introduced something called Home Sharing. This is what the ATV2 uses to access content on other devices in your house. At the moment only iTunes itself has Home Sharing support.
In addition, the actual streaming mechanism used is new, and called Airplay. Again, only iTunes and iOS have Airplay support, but Apple are promising to open this up further and it has already been hacked to work in various other ways.
The long and the short of it is that you need to have iTunes itself running in order for the Apple TV 2 to be able to access your media.
Edited by aspender on Thursday 6th January 10:55
Don't waste your money. I gave up on the ATV, and went back to a PC for doing my home entertainment stuff.
The ATV's HD video support is pointless, renting or buying movies off iTunes is pretty poor (waited 2 days for a HD movie to download on 20Mb broadband and then it didn't work). Playing iTunes music is fine, but Winamp on the PC does that too.
The ATV's HD video support is pointless, renting or buying movies off iTunes is pretty poor (waited 2 days for a HD movie to download on 20Mb broadband and then it didn't work). Playing iTunes music is fine, but Winamp on the PC does that too.
I bought a couple of ZyXEL DMA 1000's from eBay for about £20 each (there's one on eBay at the moment for 99p with no bids...) for the kids bedrooms, streaming films from my ReadyNAS.
They're more picky about formats than my Popcorn Hour, but I've found that .VOB files work fine for TV. They'll also stream music apparently, although I haven't tried.
They work OK over homeplugs too, although I've ran some cat5 cable to one of the rooms now while I had the floorboards up to plumb in a new radiator.
They connect to the TV either by Scart or HDMI.
They're more picky about formats than my Popcorn Hour, but I've found that .VOB files work fine for TV. They'll also stream music apparently, although I haven't tried.
They work OK over homeplugs too, although I've ran some cat5 cable to one of the rooms now while I had the floorboards up to plumb in a new radiator.
They connect to the TV either by Scart or HDMI.
I guess all this means that the Apple TV is a no-no - 1Mb connection, no HDMI, no freeview, no streaming from my NAS....
I like the look of the "ZyXEL DMA 1000" but it's only HDMI which I don't have....
The PS3 is looking like a winner - can that stream well (at all) from a NAS at all?
I like the look of the "ZyXEL DMA 1000" but it's only HDMI which I don't have....
The PS3 is looking like a winner - can that stream well (at all) from a NAS at all?
Edited by james_tigerwoods on Thursday 6th January 10:57
aspender said:
.Mark said:
aspender, are you sure that ATV2 only works with macs? From what I have read it'll stream stuff from iTunes on a PC too.
I hope that's the case or I'm stuffed
You are correct, for OSX in my post, read iTunes. I'll edit it.I hope that's the case or I'm stuffed
Edited by aspender on Thursday 6th January 10:57
I may be an Apple fan, I know it's my fault, but the stuff seems to just work. Except I still use old fashioned Windows
james_tigerwoods said:
smn159 said:
james_tigerwoods said:
I like the look of the "ZyXEL DMA 1000" but it's only HDMI which I don't have....
As I said above, it's either Scart or HDMI - I'm using Scart myself on one of the boxes...
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