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Getting Apple TV to access server?

shirokado
By shirokado
in Home Theater Equipment
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Considering buying an Apple TV for my living room, can I access media from my local server? How about a Nexus player?

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Considering buying an Apple TV for my living room, can I access media from my local server? How about a Nexus player?

 

Get some sort of xbmc machine

"In the middle of every difficulty lies opportunity."
- Albert Einstein

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Roku Box or Fire TV then Stick Plex on it works great if your NAS has Plex support (Yes plex is pay but its a lot less faff than XMBC) and has some nice stuff like downloading to device and transcoding built it. Lifetime pass is only like 50 bucks anyway (or 2 bucks a month).

 

I have a Roku and Fire TV. Roku has a much nicer interface but the fire TV (especially stick) is a huge amount snappier.

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Roku Box or Fire TV then Stick Plex on it works great if your NAS has Plex support (Yes plex is pay but its a lot less faff than XMBC) and has some nice stuff like downloading to device and transcoding built it. Lifetime pass is only like 50 bucks anyway (or 2 bucks a month).

 

I have a Roku and Fire TV. Roku has a much nicer interface but the fire TV (especially stick) is a huge amount snappier.

I decided on the Apple TV or Nexus player because the roku is ugly IMO and I don't like amazon's hardware.

Fractal Design Define R4 | MSI x79a-GD45 | 3960X @ 4.6Ghz | Lots of EK Blocks | EVGA GTX780Ti 3GB | Corsair Dominator Platinum 16GB (4x4) DDR3 1866 | Samsung 840 Pro 512GB SSD | Western Digital Red 2TB x4 (Raid 10) | Corsair AX760 | Windows 7 Professional 64-bit

 

 

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Considering buying an Apple TV

 

I just stream stuff over plex from my iPhone to my Apple TV

 

It can also access your iTunes library over your network so it can play music, movies and photos etc

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I just stream stuff over plex from my iPhone to my Apple TV

 

It can also access your iTunes library over your network so it can play music, movies and photos etc

 

Aye plex or XMBC.. The massive advantage of plex is the lack of effort required. Was well worth the money so I can be extremely lazy :).

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Aye plex or XMBC.. The massive advantage of plex is the lack of effort required. Was well worth the money so I can be extremely lazy :).

 

Yeah install plex on my server, app on my phone, = all done

Desktop - Corsair 300r i7 4770k H100i MSI 780ti 16GB Vengeance Pro 2400mhz Crucial MX100 512gb Samsung Evo 250gb 2 TB WD Green, AOC Q2770PQU 1440p 27" monitor Laptop Clevo W110er - 11.6" 768p, i5 3230m, 650m GT 2gb, OCZ vertex 4 256gb,  4gb ram, Server: Fractal Define Mini, MSI Z78-G43, Intel G3220, 8GB Corsair Vengeance, 4x 3tb WD Reds in Raid 10, Phone Oppo Reno 10x 256gb , Camera Sony A7iii

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I decided on the Apple TV or Nexus player because the roku is ugly IMO and I don't like amazon's hardware.

thats not really how someone should properly judge a piece of hardware....

 

tho I guess with all the apple-fanboys ..its sadly more common then it should be :rolleyes:

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thats not really how someone should properly judge a piece of hardware....

 

tho I guess with all the apple-fanboys ..its sadly more common then it should be :rolleyes:

Design is a very important factor. It can be a super computer in a roku, if it's ugly I won't buy it.

Fractal Design Define R4 | MSI x79a-GD45 | 3960X @ 4.6Ghz | Lots of EK Blocks | EVGA GTX780Ti 3GB | Corsair Dominator Platinum 16GB (4x4) DDR3 1866 | Samsung 840 Pro 512GB SSD | Western Digital Red 2TB x4 (Raid 10) | Corsair AX760 | Windows 7 Professional 64-bit

 

 

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I just stream stuff over plex from my iPhone to my Apple TV

 

It can also access your iTunes library over your network so it can play music, movies and photos etc

So, I install plex on my server, app on my phone, then stream to apple tv?

Fractal Design Define R4 | MSI x79a-GD45 | 3960X @ 4.6Ghz | Lots of EK Blocks | EVGA GTX780Ti 3GB | Corsair Dominator Platinum 16GB (4x4) DDR3 1866 | Samsung 840 Pro 512GB SSD | Western Digital Red 2TB x4 (Raid 10) | Corsair AX760 | Windows 7 Professional 64-bit

 

 

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So, I install plex on my server, app on my phone, then stream to apple tv?

 

yeah basically :) just airplay it across 

 

 

Although I just now buy all my movies on itunes anyway so I just press play :P

Desktop - Corsair 300r i7 4770k H100i MSI 780ti 16GB Vengeance Pro 2400mhz Crucial MX100 512gb Samsung Evo 250gb 2 TB WD Green, AOC Q2770PQU 1440p 27" monitor Laptop Clevo W110er - 11.6" 768p, i5 3230m, 650m GT 2gb, OCZ vertex 4 256gb,  4gb ram, Server: Fractal Define Mini, MSI Z78-G43, Intel G3220, 8GB Corsair Vengeance, 4x 3tb WD Reds in Raid 10, Phone Oppo Reno 10x 256gb , Camera Sony A7iii

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yeah basically :) just airplay it across 

 

 

Although I just now buy all my movies on itunes anyway so I just press play :P

I buy all my moveis on amazon, maybe I should consider buying from iTunes

Fractal Design Define R4 | MSI x79a-GD45 | 3960X @ 4.6Ghz | Lots of EK Blocks | EVGA GTX780Ti 3GB | Corsair Dominator Platinum 16GB (4x4) DDR3 1866 | Samsung 840 Pro 512GB SSD | Western Digital Red 2TB x4 (Raid 10) | Corsair AX760 | Windows 7 Professional 64-bit

 

 

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I buy all my moveis on amazon, maybe I should consider buying from iTunes

 

I just find it easy to stream them from Apple TV,  i also have them downloaded and backed up to my file server

Desktop - Corsair 300r i7 4770k H100i MSI 780ti 16GB Vengeance Pro 2400mhz Crucial MX100 512gb Samsung Evo 250gb 2 TB WD Green, AOC Q2770PQU 1440p 27" monitor Laptop Clevo W110er - 11.6" 768p, i5 3230m, 650m GT 2gb, OCZ vertex 4 256gb,  4gb ram, Server: Fractal Define Mini, MSI Z78-G43, Intel G3220, 8GB Corsair Vengeance, 4x 3tb WD Reds in Raid 10, Phone Oppo Reno 10x 256gb , Camera Sony A7iii

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Start with a raspberry pi with kodi installed.

 

You can OC the pi a little and its cheap to buy AND if you end up not using it or wanting a bigger set up you can all way use it somewhere else

 

I don't recommend this. The Raspberry Pi's hardware is not up to it unless you are happy with 480p. If you are purely going for a HTPC to stream media from a server then I would get something like a Beebox or Brix with a Celeron CPU in it.

 

If you are looking for a full console replacement to use game stream as well as maybe DVR functionality that's when it would be worth building a full media PC with a Pentium.

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Yea I agree, but for starting off its fine. All my pi's can stream 1080p OC'd with no problems, Blue rays arent so good.

 

Blu rays are a complete pain in the arse on Linux of any kind. The best solution seems to be to convert it into an MKV in realtime, play the MKV as it's being created and then delete the MKV afterwards. You may as well not bother deleting it and just keep your ripped blu rays on your NAS. But that's technically "piracy" according to UK courts.

 

Once again DRM prevents legitimate purchasers of content from using said content and forces them to resort to legally questionable means just to watch the bloody things.

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