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iTunes 7.3 now supports streaming photos

I

imlucid

macrumors 6502
Original poster
May 3, 2007
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With iTunes 7.3 and the Apple TV 1.1 update, you can now stream your photos as well. If you are set up to sync from iTunes, turn on syncing of photos (even if they won't fit) and you can now use them for your screensaver or slideshow when streaming from iTunes.

When streaming from a non-synced source, make sure you select the Apple TV from the list in iTunes 7.3 and turn on streaming under the photos tab.

Kevin
 
All my photos streamed perfectly and MOST importantly, the dozens of slideshows I've created in iPhoto streams with music! Now I don't have to sync a single song on the :apple: tv to play in its slideshow feature. Heck, I won't be needing the slideshow function in :apple: tv. Who the heck needs the HD now when you can steam everything!!!
 
This is the most awesome thing to come out of today (since I don't have an iphone ahhah :( ). I'm pleased though that they added this, makes it much easier to show photos from across the multiple computers in the house.
 
Can AppleTV stream Canon Raw pics from iPhoto or does it simply convert them somehow during streaming?

Is there any Wake-On-Lan support yet?
 
imlucid said:
With iTunes 7.3 and the Apple TV 1.1 update, you can now stream your photos as well. If you are set up to sync from iTunes, turn on syncing of photos (even if they won't fit) and you can now use them for your screensaver or slideshow when streaming from iTunes.

When streaming from a non-synced source, make sure you select the Apple TV from the list in iTunes 7.3 and turn on streaming under the photos tab.

Kevin
Click to expand...

I have updated to iTunes 7.3 and I get NO option to stream under the 'Photos' tab when I select my :apple: TV. I'd like to not sync them as they are taking up nearly 5GB of the hard drive and I'd rather add some more movies in their place. Is there something I'm missing or need to click/check/enable to get the streaming option to show up?
 

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OK, I'm having trouble with this. I downloaded 7.3, but under the Photos tab of my Apple TV there is nothing that says "streaming" - only "Sync" (see attached pic). I've also looked in the iTunes help for "streaming photos" and this is the entry:

Viewing photos on your TV using an Apple TV
If you have an Apple TV, you can view digital photos on your TV. You can either sync photos from your computer to your Apple TV (for instructions, click the first link below), or you can stream them from a computer.

To stream photos to your TV:
Set up your Apple TV to stream from the iTunes library on the computer with the photos you want to stream (click the second link below for instructions).
In iTunes, click Photos.
If you don't see the Apple TV (under Devices) or the Photos tab, make sure you are using Apple TV software version 1.1 or later.

Choose the photos you want to stream and click Apply.
If you select a different item in the iTunes source pane (Music, for example), and the Apple TV disappears from the list, choose this iTunes library as the source on your Apple TV.

Related Topics
Syncing your Apple TV with iTunes
Playing your iTunes library on your TV using Apple TV
Go to
Apple TV website

Any idea what I'm doing wrong?
 

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I was having trouble with this too, but I've figured part of it out at least. In order to stream from your 'sync-ed' computer, you have to turn on syncing in the photos tab of the :apple:TV pane in iTunes. I re-read the OP's post carefully, and this is what it says to do. I can now see my photos on my :apple:TV, though only as slideshows -- you can't navigate to specific photos.

What I haven't figured out yet is how to stream photos from a non sync-ed computer. The instructions say to select the :apple:TV from the list in iTunes, but the :apple:TV isn't in my list on a non sync-ed computer.
 
Hey, I was just fooling around with it some more, and now the :apple:TV does show up in my devices on a streaming computer, and there's a 'photo' tab, and I can select to 'Share Photos From:" and select a folder or specify which iPhoto albums to use. I guess it works after all...
 
I had to play around with it myself...don't remember the steps though. I went into my :apple:tv and connected to new iTunes from sources after updating my iTunes to 7.3. Found my :apple:tv and right-clicked it to select Streaming. Went to the Photos tab to select from iPhoto.
 

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Cave Man said:
But now you can't sync other content, such as music, movies and TV shows?
Click to expand...

Sure you can -- you're just adding photos to the types of media that you're telling your :apple:TV to sync. Remember that the :apple:TV prioritizes the content that it syncs, in this order: movies, TV shows, music, podcasts, photos. In my case, it would never get to the photos because I have too much video content, but by turning on photo syncing, it permits streaming of that same content when I have the sync-ed computer selected as the 'source', rather than the :apple:TV.

Another way to look at it is this: if you want to be able to stream photos to your TV, select them (in iTunes) as sync-ed content, even if they won't fit on the :apple:TV HD, then you can stream them. I think that they have you sync selection process just so you can tell the :apple:TV which albums you also want to be able to stream. This way you're not streaming photos to the :apple:TV that you may not want just anyone to have access to!
 
For Apple TVs that are synced to iTunes, it bases whether or not to stream photos based on the sync settings.

For Apple TVs that are streamed only to iTunes, it bases this on an explicit option in the Photos tab under Apple TV.

Kevin
 
OK I have read everyones experiences here and really looked at the TV with this setup. I don't know if this is an oversight on Apples part or what but ....

Ok for "Non-Synced" that is Streaming Only computers this works great! The TV shows up in Devices and you can select the TV and tell it to stream. You can also pick and choose which albums or slideshows to stream or pick the whole library. It works and it works great.

Now onto the "Synced" computer. You go to iTunes on the synced computer and you can select which folders or albums or slideshows to sync to the machine (Ie transfer to TV hard drive). Fine great .. they go there. Now you go to the TV and go to sources and go to stream from the computer your synced with. Now your streaming from that computer. You will now see that there is a photo selection in there. You would now think you can stream your whole library on that computer. Nope... you open it up and all it streams is the same folders you selected to sync with it. Which doesn't work well with me when I border on 20,000 + photos and don't want to sync that to my TV hard drive.

So the new streaming feature is great when streaming from other computers in the house. I find it very hard to believe that this was the intended way they wanted this.

Anyone once they really look into it getting the same result? Anyone else think this is odd?

Kevin :apple:
 
So I assume that if I were to get an :apple:TV, I could sync a bunch of movies and video-Podcasts, but stream Music, Photo's and remaining Movie/TV-Shows from that same machine as well?

Any sign of 'Wake-On-Lan' support yet? (to wake a sleeping machine in another part of the house)
 
I'm a little frustrated here. I'm trying to get my mother-in-laws Windows computer to stream photos to an Apple TV, which is synced off my iBook. I downloaded iTunes 7.3 to her computer and connected it just fine. I can stream music, and tv shows and movies (if she had any, that is), but there's no option to stream photos from Apple TV. And the Apple TV itself disappeared off her devices list a few seconds after I entered the passcode.

What the heck do I do?
 
OldSkoolNJ said:
...You would now think you can stream your whole library on that computer. Nope... you open it up and all it streams is the same folders you selected to sync with it. Which doesn't work well with me when I border on 20,000 + photos and don't want to sync that to my TV hard drive.
Click to expand...

Remember that photos have the lowest sync-ing priority, so even if you tell iTunes to sync your whole photo library, it will only sync as many photos as it can (if any) into the space it has left on the :apple:TV after it has sync-ed all your other selected content (movies, tv shows, music, podcasts). You don't have to worry about photos taking up any valuable :apple:TV HD space that you need for other content.

Because of the way Apple set this up, though, you will still be able to stream any selected photos that couldn't fit onto the :apple:TV's HD.

So, why not allow streaming of your entire photo library regardless of what you chose to sync? Well, in my case our :apple:TV is used by several people, and I don't want everyone that uses the :apple:TV to have access to my entire photo library. By only streaming the photos that are selected to sync, I can control which photos in my library are 'publicly' accessible via the :apple:TV, and which are private.

Why stream your 'public' photos if you've already selected to sync them too? In my case iTunes will never sync any photos, because I have too much higher-priority stuff set to sync already, so if I'm going to view any of the photos from my sync-ed computer I'll only be able to do it by streaming. Said another way, all of the selected photos will be available by streaming, even if only some (or none, as it is for me) are on the :apple:TV's HD.

If you want the whole photo library from your sync-ed computer available by streaming, just tell iTunes to sync all your photos. It won't be able to sync them all, but they will all be available by streaming, and they won't take up any :apple:TV HD space that you need for anything else.
 
Ever since 1.1 came out there is an option in iTunes to give Photos priority. WHich is it will sync them before all else. It is right under the photo tab below the ALbum dialogue box. Just click that and they will sync before all else.

Kevin
 
OldSkoolNJ said:
Ever since 1.1 came out there is an option in iTunes to give Photos priority.
Click to expand...

That may be useful for some, but as far as I'm concerned I'm just as happy my photos don't sync, as long as they can stream. I have way more content (of all varieties) than the 40Gb HD will hold, so I mostly rely on streaming anyway. On top of that, I'm glad the 'sync' settings for photos also apply to streamed photos, so I can control which photos are available via streaming.
 
sandman42 said:
That may be useful for some, but as far as I'm concerned I'm just as happy my photos don't sync, as long as they can stream. I have way more content (of all varieties) than the 40Gb HD will hold, so I mostly rely on streaming anyway. On top of that, I'm glad the 'sync' settings for photos also apply to streamed photos, so I can control which photos are available via streaming.
Click to expand...

The problem here is with these new settings it seemes as though something was missed with regards to your syncing computer. The only photos that will stream from you rmain machine are the ones that are already synced so whats the point? It seems like something was missed in regards to this feature on the main computer.

Kevin
 
OldSkoolNJ said:
The problem here is with these new settings it seemes as though something was missed with regards to your syncing computer. The only photos that will stream from you rmain machine are the ones that are already synced so whats the point? It seems like something was missed in regards to this feature on the main computer.

Kevin
Click to expand...

I know it seems like it doesn't make sense, but it does. The point of streaming the photos you select to sync is that in case they don't fit on the :apple:TV's HD you still have access to them via streaming. By limiting the streamed photos to those that you chose to sync, you have control over what photos are available by streaming, in case you want to keep some of your photos private. See my earlier post about this above.

I think this method makes a lot of sense, now that I've thought about it. My advice to you would be to tell iTunes to sync any photos you want to have access to via :apple:TV, even if that's your whole photo library. Your computer will sync as many as it can (without displacing any of your video, music or podcasts), and if they don't all fit you can stream them. If you have any photos you don't want to share with the other users of your :apple:TV, don't sync them and no one can see them, not even by streaming.
 
Here is another small tip if you are still having trouble with this (as I was until a moment ago). Once you set iTunes to sync some photos, you will not be able to stream them until :apple: TV "loads" that computer again. The easiest way I found was to set the source to ATV and then set it again to the iTunes computer.

As stated above,
1) you can only see the folder that your told iTunes to sync, and
2) you only get to see those photos as a slide show.
 
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