Apple TV

stoeger2000

Quick question for the tech savvy people on here.
I have a hard drive full of movies an tv series etc, which I can watch on my laptop, a mac. I mostly use QuickTime player or VLC.
If I get Apple TV can I use it to watch these on my tv? I know that I can use it to watch stuff off my iTunes account, but can I watch stuff that is on an external hard drive?
I previously used to run if thru an xbox but recently it seems to recognise fewer files and sometimes doesn't recognise the drives!
Any help appreciated!

yoyo

stoeger2000 wrote: »

Quick question for the tech savvy people on here.
I have a hard drive full of movies an tv series etc, which I can watch on my laptop, a mac. I mostly use QuickTime player or VLC.
If I get Apple TV can I use it to watch these on my tv? I know that I can use it to watch stuff off my iTunes account, but can I watch stuff that is on an external hard drive?
I previously used to run if thru an xbox but recently it seems to recognise fewer files and sometimes doesn't recognise the drives!
Any help appreciated!

I think you need to jailbreak the apple TV to do this. I'll move this over to the Apple devices forum where its more suited


Nick

stoeger2000

yoyo wrote: »

I think you need to jailbreak the apple TV to do this. I'll move this over to the Apple devices forum where its more suited


Nick

Thanks Nick,

Would I be better off just getting a PC device which would have a built in hard drive to leave connected to the tv? Could use that instead of the xbox to watch stuff. Or can I just get a cable to connect the MacBook Pro straight into the tv?

fox007

stoeger2000 wrote: »

Thanks Nick,

Would I be better off just getting a PC device which would have a built in hard drive to leave connected to the tv? Could use that instead of the xbox to watch stuff. Or can I just get a cable to connect the MacBook Pro straight into the tv?

Yes you can get a thunder bolt to hdmi cable that will do this just be weiry
Tho of cheaper cables will not carry sound just picture

yoyo

stoeger2000 wrote: »

Thanks Nick,

Would I be better off just getting a PC device which would have a built in hard drive to leave connected to the tv? Could use that instead of the xbox to watch stuff. Or can I just get a cable to connect the MacBook Pro straight into the tv?

A cheap Android mini PC with HDMI output may be a solution as Android can run XBMC without needing jail breaking. Just check the device runs XBMC OK, some cheaper ones may not


Nick

LukeS_

You won't be able to do it without jailbreaking. Apple's device, Apple's ecosystem and all that stuff.

There are plenty of different media-streaming devices (even some Blu-Ray players have streaming capabilities these days) out there that are capable of streaming your content, though. Media-streaming players are ubiquitous at this stage now, with the ever-growing popularity of on-demand streaming services like Netflix.

There are a vast array of Android devices out there, but in my experience, they usually have awful UI for navigating with a remote, makes the experience a pain in the backside; with the upside of those being that you have full Android capabilities.

So the short answer is:

You can't with stock firmware. You can with jailbroken AppleTV firmware and other similar devices.

carrotcake

I was in a similar position, and was using an iPhone/iPad app to stream the video from my laptop and beam it to my Apple TV using AirPlay.

Eventually I got tired of this and got a Raspberry Pi. Haven't looked back since. The Pi is connected to the TV, and plays videos (on XBMC) from the attached external hard drive. Also, since it's connected to my local network, it's acting a media server, so it can stream videos to phones, laptops, etc in the house.

glack

stoeger2000 wrote: »

Quick question for the tech savvy people on here.
I have a hard drive full of movies an tv series etc, which I can watch on my laptop, a mac. I mostly use QuickTime player or VLC.
If I get Apple TV can I use it to watch these on my tv? I know that I can use it to watch stuff off my iTunes account, but can I watch stuff that is on an external hard drive?
I previously used to run if thru an xbox but recently it seems to recognise fewer files and sometimes doesn't recognise the drives!
Any help appreciated!

Is your mac laptop capable of airplay? If so it works as easily as mirroring with an iphone or ipad. My 2013 macbook pro works over airplay. very handy but not sure at what stage airplay was included on mac laptops. should be easy enough to find out if your mac is compatible or not.

alastair

If you've the hard drive accessible on a network, then why not use a nowtv box from Sky with Plex? It's £10 plus delivery from the UK, and will handle most of your files no bother. As above - Apple TV won't be much use to you unless you jailbreak and put XBMC or similar on, or use airplay with another device.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2057001096

stoeger2000

cheers for the advice everyone, just had a look online there now for a Raspberry pi device as that seems like the best option for me at the moment. not crazy expensive either! any other options i should be looking at?? dont mind if they are bigger in size than the raspberry pi, i just want something that does the job.

redzerdrog

Firstly I know very little as I am not an apple person but I am thinking of getting the missus the apple tv, so question is, is it any good?

I know you can watch netflix and that on tv but can you watch stuff like projectfreetv or streamed football matches?

alastair

redzerdrog wrote: »

Firstly I know very little as I am not an apple person but I am thinking of getting the missus the apple tv, so question is, is it any good?

I know you can watch netflix and that on tv but can you watch stuff like projectfreetv or streamed football matches?

Not unless you jailbreak it, and you can't jailbreak the current version - you'd need to buy a secondhand older one, or wait for the arrival of a new jailbreak. Once jailbroken - sure.

redzerdrog

alastair wrote: »

Not unless you jailbreak it, and you can't jailbreak the current version - you'd need to buy a secondhand older one, or wait for the arrival of a new jailbreak. Once jailbroken - sure.

Prob better off just getting the connection cable that conects the ipad to tv then, or is there any other added bonuses to getting apple tv?

yoyo

redzerdrog wrote: »

Prob better off just getting the connection cable that conects the ipad to tv then, or is there any other added bonuses to getting apple tv?

Can you not stream the ipad to the Apple TV? I think there are limitations to this, with some apps not allowing it. XBMC is a great media centre, but only works with Jailbroken iOs devices (and as above there probably wont be a current Apple TV jailbreak) or get a cheap Android mini PC (XBMC capable) or Raspberry Pi and plug it into the TV.

Nick

celticsfan

guys sorry to jump into this thread! but im also buying one of these for someone as a gift, i use android myself (dont shoot).. but what does one of these let you do? can you watch itunes media,rent films,browse the internet on the tv and listen to your itunes music files? the person im buying it for has their itunes on a normal windows pc,so does it sync with that or something?

cheers

curly.bert

I have an Apple TV (3rd gen) and find it a great device. If you want to know what it can do, browse one of the many demo videos on YouTube or read a review (like this one from TechRadar - http://www.techradar.com/reviews/audio-visual/av-accessories/apple-tv-900409/review)

My own summary:
The good features: nice, easy to use UI; good range of legal content (iTunes, Netflix, YouTube), AirPlay
Bad: You cannot connect a hard drive full of movies to it

If you're a bit techy, the Plex/PlexConnect hack is great. This hijacks Apple's Trailers app and serves up media from a local Plex library. I use this on mine and it runs very smoothly.

For the uninitiated, Plex is an excellent free media server (www.plexapp.com) which is very easy to use. PlexConnect requires some command-line skills though, so it's only an option if you're comfortable with that. (https://github.com/iBaa/PlexConnect)

Out of the box, the Apple TV is a grand product for legal content, but if you want to use lots of "locally stored" media, you might be better off looking at something like a Roku.

mad muffin

Is anyone having problems with Irish Netflix on their Apple TV? I have an Apple TV 2 in tge kitchen and a 3 I'm the lounge. Both are having problems with erroring out or not getting the full bandwidth or just stopping mud stream.

It's working perfectly on my ps3.