Duh.. It totally slipped my mind about the external drive. One other question, this will always need to boot from usb right?
If I plug in my external drive and my usb boot into a hub I shouldn't have any issues right?
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iTunes Server
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Duh.. It totally slipped my mind about the external drive. One other question, this will always need to boot from usb right?
If I plug in my external drive and my usb boot into a hub I shouldn't have any issues right?
The original drive is just a 2.5" IDE drive, so any other 2.5" IDE should work.
edit: bah, too late.
edit2: don't mean to derail, but I see that a lot of users here do have 10.4 running on ATV1, did you have to boot the ATV drive on your mac?
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I would highly recommend not booting from USB, it really creates a ton of headaches in both installation and subsequent operation.
Buy a cheap small torx set, pull the original drive, clone "the" 10.5.8 image to the original drive using CCC (you'll need some sort of 2.5" PATA<->USB adapter to temporarily attach the bare stock drive to your Mac), replace the drive in the ATV, boot. Once you have everything configured you can attach external storage and start setting up your library.
@AdrianK - Most people running OS X on the ATV1 are using Leopard, not Tiger. You will avoid a lot of headaches by just using "the" 10.5.8 image: no need to boot it attached to your Mac, just clone and go.
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I have an 80gb pata drive, I used disk utility to clone the image to the drive. it booted with the question mark.. Selected the 10.5.8 dmg as source and 80gb drive as destination, GUID partition and it didn't work..
If I use CCC will it be any different?
Another question.. I plan on using my ATV server as an iTunes file server (duh)
should I just use a folder to store my library, then map my iTunes to the server or.. Should I add all my media to iTunes (on the server) and if that's how I do it, how would I sync my iPhone with that library?
should I just use a folder to store my library, then map my iTunes to the server or.. Should I add all my media to iTunes (on the server) and if that's how I do it, how would I sync my iPhone with that library?
If you already have all your media on an external drive, just set up your machine, run iTunes, and change the default library location to your external drive. If you don't mind iTunes messing with your folder structure you may want to let iTunes take control of file organization as well. Then ensure that you have enabled file sharing for that folder.
The way I manage mine is by setting up the external drive as a shared volume on my network. I do all my Handbrake encoding on a quad-core Hackintosh, then once the file is done (transcoded, subtitles added, tagged) I drag it (via Finder) over to the "Automatically add files to iTunes" folder that iTunes will create on the external drive and will make available on the network. The file copies to that folder and then "disappears" once iTunes (running on the ATV1 server) sees it, adds it to your library, and places it in the appropriate location within the existing folder structure.
Really is very slick means of media transfer and management! One of the reasons I love OS X.
I too am throwing around the idea of a mac mini. I intend to replace a PC with it that is only used for itunes and storing photos.
Few questions...
Can I run hdmi from the mini to a nearby reciever and play audio? Maybe using "remote" app?
Mac mini has a headphone jack that can be used as a digital optical out? Never heard that one before... howd they do that?
In the near future id like to start ripping and storing my Blu-ray collection to some kind of storage unit. Ive read the mac cant do the newer audio codecs? Is that true? Can it at least bitstream them?
thanks!
Few questions...
Can I run hdmi from the mini to a nearby reciever and play audio? Maybe using "remote" app?
Mac mini has a headphone jack that can be used as a digital optical out? Never heard that one before... howd they do that?
In the near future id like to start ripping and storing my Blu-ray collection to some kind of storage unit. Ive read the mac cant do the newer audio codecs? Is that true? Can it at least bitstream them?
thanks!
Yes.
Mini TOSLINK
I don't really have an answer for this...but if you're ripping them, you can encode them with whatever codec you want, so it shouldn't be an issue, you just might not be able to rip on the Mac?
Great! I just want a rip of strictly the movie and the sound. Will I have any issues with high resolution audio. What about 3d?
Not sure about 3D, never tried it. HD audio has been supported in the mkv container for a while now and MakeMKV does support it as part of the ripping process, but of course playback will depend on the software you choose.
Thanks Bill! Maybe I'm too new to this stuff or simply not understanding it. I just read on another forum that you can rip a blu ray with the mini, but there is no way, at this time, to play back any of the new audio codecs (especially dts-ma) either by decoding it on the mini or streaming the bitstream to a receiver. Is that not correct? Thanks again for your help!
@iso at 85W max power consumption and only 11W at idle, you'd be hard pressed to beat the green credentials of the new Mac Mini's, even with an Atom machine. Add in that it's not difficult to imagine one of these Mini's serving up content for six or seven years, and there are some serious cost savings to be had there.
YMMV.
Ok..... I installed Leopard on my ATV1 and it is working great, easiest hack I've ever completed.
My next question is whether any one knows of a pata to sata adapter that is compatible with the ATV1? I have a spare 1Tb sata hdd and would love to use that to hold the OS and media files, while using my external as backup.
My next question is whether any one knows of a pata to sata adapter that is compatible with the ATV1? I have a spare 1Tb sata hdd and would love to use that to hold the OS and media files, while using my external as backup.
While those are good numbers for the Mini, OP said 2TB+ of media was in his/her library. You're not accounting for that storage in your power usage numbers. Also, the initial cost of the machine goes up from the $599 price vs the cost of the machine I proposed, which included 3TB of storage.
As far as the mini serving up content for 6 or seven years, how do you figure that would be any different than the machine I proposed? In fact, going by Apple's track record, you'll only be able to update the OS for another 3 years. Not sure how far back iTunes updates will work, but as of now, it only supports 2 OS revisions (10.5, which works out to 4 years time.) iTunes on Windows, however, goes back to XP, which was released 10 years ago (granted, it is SP 2, but any machine that can run XP initial release should be able to run XP SP 2.)
Personally, I would prefer a Mini as well, but to me the cost just wasn't justifiable and I believe I'll get a longer life out of a Windows/Atom machine for this purpose.
YMMV
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And Mr. ISO is the winner... Though, I didn't build a machine. I ended up not getting the Mini. It hadn't shipped yet, and I was able to cancel the order. I use my Drobo for too many other things to have it solely dedicated for media streaming.
I ended up going with a $330 Acer AspireRevo 3700. It has Win 7 on it, and while it isn't the work horse a Mini might end up being, for the price, it'll do the big stuff that I wanted out of the Mini and a little more. I just hook it in as another source in the monitor for my real computer, and it switches over just fine, plus it has an HDMI port if I ever decide to put it by the ATV at the TV.
Anywho, thanks for all the responses, but for now, I think this is the best option I could get that'll run well with the Windows hardware I already have.
I ended up going with a $330 Acer AspireRevo 3700. It has Win 7 on it, and while it isn't the work horse a Mini might end up being, for the price, it'll do the big stuff that I wanted out of the Mini and a little more. I just hook it in as another source in the monitor for my real computer, and it switches over just fine, plus it has an HDMI port if I ever decide to put it by the ATV at the TV.
Anywho, thanks for all the responses, but for now, I think this is the best option I could get that'll run well with the Windows hardware I already have.