Apple TV

Didn't appreciate the possibilities of this until I got an Airport Express

Couple of questions (it's easier to ask here than try to find the answers on the Apple site!):

My wireless router is 802.11g, is this fast enough to stream HD video to the Apple TV? (I'm assuming 802.11n will connect using a 'g' link)

Is there any point in going for the one with the larger HDD? Surely if the file is on the main computer, you don't really need a HDD at all?

Me too I was surprised to be using it as much as I do. Apple TV also functions as AirTunes btw. I bought the 160GB but that was unnecessary, I stream everything and store nothing. On g you should be fine except for a small buffer and probably no fast forward/rewind.

Great, thanks.

Not sure about the fast forward/rewind though- when I do that on the PS3 it seems to just skip frames... I think

All I have to do now is persuade the SO that I really, really need one

Two simple questions:
1) Can I watch iPlayer/4oD on Apple TV
2) Can I watch live TV using an Elgato device plugged in to my Mac (or ideally the Apple TV)?

1) No. There is no browser on the Apple TV and so no way to access the sites.
2) No idea.

Check out:

http://boxee.tv/



ta,
P.

It should be called iTunes TV with You Tube - that's the limitation I'm afraid. You can export EyeTV recorded programs to iTunes of course but not an ideal set up.

The TV in our house is actually an iMac running EyeTV 3. The Apple TV connects to a projector for when we want to films.

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2) Can I watch live TV using an Elgato device plugged in to my Mac

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Yes. All Freeview channels in your area.

I use the EyeTV DTT stick. (The Low end model). Good for watching, recording, burning DVD's with Toast and copying to iPod, Touch etc
Comes with EyeTV 3 software and 1 year sub to tvtv EPG

Much as I suspected...

boxee has promise, but still not there yet as it doesn't steam live TV from an elgato (or similar). There does seem to be an iPlayer plugin for xmbc, but that looks a bit early days.

Thanks all...

OK, the beast has arrived courtesy of UPS and I've been playing with it

Some questions...

1. I can only use Apple TV (playing a movie) and the Airport Express (playing music) simultaneously if I start the music first, if I start a movie first iTunes then can't send to the Airport- I get an "unknown error" when it tries to find it. So far that seems to be true even when using two computers... it's not a disaster, but it's not what I was expecting.

2. It seems to only work by "pulling" data from iTunes, it doesn't seem that you can use iTunes to "send" a movie to the the TV (a music track is OK). Bit of a bummer if you can't find the remote, which looks far to easy to mislay .

3. I can't see any way to put it on to standby without going through the menus. I've no environmental objection to leaving it on 24/7, but I'd marginally prefer not to.

In all cases, is that working as intended or have I missed something?

It won't respond to the remote that came with the iMac either (no, it's not paired), but there's some other oddities with the remotes that I need to investigate before asking any definite questions.

This should help explain the different configurations:
http://support.apple.com/kb/TA38571

1. I know it's not helpful but I can do this with mine - from one iTunes library on the Mac Pro I can initiate a movie stream via Apple TV interface and then back on iTunes itself, initiate another stream (audio) to the Airport Express (and vice versa). It also works for as many computers as there are devices to stream to. Maybe you have a network issue - I've given all my devices a static (local) IP address.

2. Yep that's right you can't control Apple TV from iTunes but you can select it as an AirTunes device (audio only).

3. Press and hold Menu on the remote for about 6 seconds for standby mode. I tend to turn off the power rather than stand by.

Tip: Genius will significantly increase the time ATV is ready to stream on start-up. Turning Genius off requires you to log-in to your iTunes Store account.

PS I have the opposite problem to you - all my remotes control all my devices at once - it's impossible to allocate a remote to a single device, the preferences just don't stick. When i want to increase the volume on ATV, I end up having the Macbook Air & Apple HiFi respond as well not to mention any friends that might be in the vicinity or maybe eyeTV on the iMac, it can be chaos

Edited by deleted (Mon 12-Jan-09 20:21:25)

Ta for the link- it's for v1.x and mine's v2.2, but still handy

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I've given all my devices a static (local) IP address.

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Ah, mine are dynamic but they don't need to be. I'll give that a try tomorrow.

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you can't control Apple TV from iTunes

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Thought so

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Press and hold Menu on the remote for about 6 seconds for standby mode.

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Just tried it- doesn't work on mine . Turning the power off requires too much grovelling around behind things

Genius is well and truly off here, I hate "helpful" computers

I think v1.x is the latest support page, at least the menu options are the same. I'm running 2.x same as you

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Maybe you have a network issue

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I think you're right, switching to fixed IPs didn't make any difference.

Don't know where to look next, I'm not a networking expert... any suggestions?

This is weird... I can run iTunes on the iMac, a MacBook and a Vista laptop... I get different resuts on all three, and also on any one of them depending on the order I do things!

Of the three, the Vista one seems the best behaved so far

And to cap it all, both Macs have started recognising the Apple TV remote but ignoring the one that came with the iMac

edit- Remotes sorted, the battery on the old one was low... I replaced it only a month ago

Edited by billford (Tue 13-Jan-09 17:34:11)

Can you describe the set up - Router + ATV + AEX how do they all connect?

iMac, static IP, wired ethernet to router (3Com 3CRWDR101A-75)

ATV, static IP, wireless 802.11g

AEX, static IP, wireless 802.11g

MacBook, dynamic IP, wireless 802.11g

Vista laptop, dynamic IP, wireless 802.11g

I've also tried the iMac on wireless, no change.

If I'm playing a movie from the iMac I can stream sound to the AEX from the Macbook from it's own library, but if I access the shared iMac library over the LAN it then can't find the AEX, even if I go back to the local library.

I'm limited on what I can try on the Vista laptop, but it seems to work regardless.

To me, it points to a problem on the iMac, but I'm prepared to be wrong

When the AEX doesn't show, does it respond to ping?

Just a note- there's nothing untoward in the router log.

Well, nothing I can blame on the ATV anyway

Yes:

PING 192.168.1.40 (192.168.1.40): 56 data bytes

64 bytes from 192.168.1.40: icmp_seq=0 ttl=255 time=68.697 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.40: icmp_seq=1 ttl=255 time=39.241 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.40: icmp_seq=2 ttl=255 time=38.790 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.40: icmp_seq=3 ttl=255 time=38.271 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.40: icmp_seq=4 ttl=255 time=45.264 ms

Just another thought- iTunes is obviously on the internal iMac drive, but the library is on an external firewire800 drive, could that make any difference?

Hmm... ping to AEX when iTunes is idle:

PING 192.168.1.40 (192.168.1.40): 56 data bytes

64 bytes from 192.168.1.40: icmp_seq=0 ttl=255 time=2.272 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.40: icmp_seq=1 ttl=255 time=2.295 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.40: icmp_seq=2 ttl=255 time=2.287 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.40: icmp_seq=3 ttl=255 time=3.014 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.40: icmp_seq=4 ttl=255 time=2.279 ms

Could something be timing out?

Ah i wondered why the pings were high in the first set, that's not the issue though. Having iTunes on external HD is not related. Since you can ping the AEX even when AirTunes is not showing suggests a Bonjour (DNS type) problem. When the Macbook joins AEX wireless instead of 3Com is it the same? I assume AEX and ATV are joining the wireless network of 3Com (ie they have internet).

Edited by deleted (Wed 14-Jan-09 01:13:36)

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suggests a Bonjour (DNS type) problem

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Everything uses the router (192.168.1.1) as its DNS server (as far as I can remember...).

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When the Macbook joins AEX wireless instead of 3Com is it the same?

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Not sure what you mean? The MacBook just joins the LAN, is there a separate way to talk to the AEX?

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I assume AEX and ATV are joining the wireless network of 3Com (ie they have internet).

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Well, the ATV has because it's just told me there's an update available, which I'm downloading now! I assume the AEX has, don't really know how to check.

I'll see how it behaves after the update, it's time I went to bed

Many thanks for your help, I'll report progress (if any) tomorrow.

Airport (triangular shape) in the menu bar lets you choose which wireless device to connect to - you should see your 3Com and AEX at least. Tip: Alt + Click on the triangle will display information such as the speed you're connected at.

I'm thinking perhaps the 3Com is having trouble with the routing which you might resolve by connecting directly to AEX instead. Depending on how you set up AEX (Airport Utility) it will either have joined your existing wireless/ethernet network (with internet access) or created one by itself (without internet access).

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Airport (triangular shape) in the menu bar lets you choose which wireless device to connect to

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Not here it doesn't... if Airport is on I get a list of available networks, not devices, if it's off I get the option to turn it on or open Network Prefs...

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Depending on how you set up AEX (Airport Utility)...

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It's joined my local network.

But I've found a repeatable set of symptoms...

As I'm sure you're aware, the ATV buffers the incoming movie stream. So I found some short movies (OU clips actually, they're free ) and investigated behaviour whilst watching the network traffic on Activity Monitor.

Basically, if ATV is streaming from either the iMac or the Macbook then neither machine can find the AEX. When the streaming finishes, both machines work fine.

So it might be a speed issue? Apple suggest using 802.11n, but my router is only a 'g'. I can live with it if it is, I've no intention of buying another router- I've only had this one for a month or so!

Sorry i do mean available networks not devices. Which network is the Macbook connected to when it loses touch with the AEX? If 3Com then try connecting Airport directly to AEX.

I don't think speed is an issue, Apple wrote that to cover itself since HD can potentially require a chunk of bandwidth. Your g network should be adequate to handle multiple streams, at least in SD.

edit: sorry, i just realised in "join existing network" you can't chose the device as they're all one network. Using Ethernet plugs to separate out AEX might do it.

Edited by deleted (Wed 14-Jan-09 13:45:20)

Ah, I see what you're getting at... you reckon I should try "Create a Wireless Network" in the AEX utility instead of just joining?

Any downsides to that?

If you don't need the AEX to provide internet access then yep that should do it - at least to test whether connecting directly to the AEX resolves the network problem.

Cheers, I'll give that a try later, bit busy at the moment .

Noticed one thing earlier- playing a movie from the iMac, after a while the ATV disappeared from the Devices list, and trying to play through the AEX brought up cannot be found on your network. But I could ping it, and it was there (and usable) on the Macbook . Still waiting to see if they come back on their own.

Definitely something odd somewhere... can't decide whether it's most likely a router, iMac or iTunes problem, but I've got no idea where to start looking . Hopefully setting up a separate AEX network will fix it.

Thanks again for your help.

It just occurred to me that when you separate AEX from the main network and create a new one, to achieve what you want all the devices which need to see each other will need to connect to it. I just tested it out to make sure it works, with or without internet access.

PS the drop outs are more likely to be the router's fault - this test will either prove or disprove it.

Edited by deleted (Wed 14-Jan-09 20:02:34)

Just finished trying it out. Had a few fits and starts and a fair bit of swearing until I worked out exactly what I was trying to do, but it works fine .

Like any wireless device, it's easier to set up via ethernet

So it's something in the router...

Main snag I can see is that the laptops can't connect to the AEX and internet at the same time, but I can live with that. If I ever need to do it, I can use ethernet cable to connect them- a quick test shows that seems to work OK.

Reasonably happy bunny now, thanks again

That's great, well done! Ethernet home plugs (on the same ring main) would solve the internet problem - they also provide an all round route so no matter which of the wireless networks you're connected to, provided they all lead back to the same router you can stream from any, to any without having to switch.

Edited by deleted (Wed 14-Jan-09 22:46:09)

I've already got part of the network running via home plugs (a PC and print server upstairs) so I thought of that as an option... but my credit card is looking a bit jaded since Christmas

I know, tomorrow is pay day for me

Something I don't understand... playing a movie (streamed) earlier and partway through the ATV lost contact with iTunes for some reason. It stopped playing and came up with the library name, greyed out. Then, without any intervention, it obviously regained contact as it reloaded the library and returned to the playlist.

I re-selected the movie, "Resume playing" and off it went... but it didn't need to re-stream anything from the iMac, it carried on playing from the "cached" file.

Any idea why it couldn't continue having lost contact? It obviously had all the data it needed stored locally...

That happens sometimes on wireless although I've yet to see it on Ethernet. Probably the wireless multicasting "are you there" type queries which run continually in the background paused briefly so it went off line. No video content beyond the buffer is stored locally, depending on the movie's file preference in iTunes it 'tags' where you left off and resumes on request. There's no delay when the network is good enough to stream real-time so that's a good sign you didn't have to wait. ATV seems to cache the file list for the connection session, until you power down so it's quick to reconnect.

Edited by deleted (Thu 15-Jan-09 20:33:59)