iTunes,videos,photo,file sharing: Airport extreme, express, hifi, iPods and laptops

[Charlie Croker]

What is the best solution for my needs without buying lots of peripherals? We have two 2010 Snow Leopard Macbook Pros and an old iPod touch. The iPod touch cannot be updated beyond 3.6.8 - cannot remember exactly the version - I am at work. It cannot use AirPlay.

I want to share videos, music and files on both laptops. I have an abundance of external G-TECH hard drives. I want to be able to play music through a hifi. With all my hard drives I thought an Airport Extreme might be a more sensible purchase than a QNAP NAS scenario.

At present, I plug in an external hard drive into the laptop, and use StreamToMe/ServeToMe software/app which lets me play the music from the hard drive through the iPod and into the hifi using a mini-jack to L/R phonos. I like budget solutions.

Can I use the Airport Extreme to do all these things? I don't want to have to buy an Express or Apple TV. Can the 2 laptops and the iPod see/play the music from the connected hard drive, playing different songs by using their separate iTunes softwares? Can someone play music in the bedroom whilst another plays a 1080 video in the living room which shows up on the HDTV via HDMI?

 

[DefBref]

An airport extreme does not have any audio or video outputs, unlike the airport express which has an audio output. As you say it would allow you to add your usb drive to the network but thats about it.

You would still need to buy 'something' to provide you with the audio/video output to your tv/hifi.

Do you intend to only use the ipod touch for control, because you could get a airport express/atv and use itunes directly to send to the devices (or the ATV could access your itunes library directly via its own interface). I also think airtunes (airplay before it added video) should be supported on your ipod and airport express.

 

[maturola]

Yeah previews post is pretty much right on the money, for what you want to do, I think you would be better of using a HTPC, maybe using AMD llano Setup. That way you add all your external HDs and use it as your media hub.

 

[Charlie Croker]

I was guessing if you were on a Macbook Pro or an iPod that you would be able reach the music on the hard drives connected to the Extreme and simply play them with iTunes, connecting the headphones socket to the hifi. Is this not possible and the Express is still in the picture? As an Apple TV is £99 and an Airport Express is £79, the Apple TV seems better value.

 

[slothrob]

I think your best solution is an aTV or two. You could connect one to your TV or stereo, with your hard drives connected to your computer, then play music and video to the stereo and TV. Two would allow you to watch TV in one room and video in another.

An aTV would be about half the cost of an Airport Extreme and add the video capability that the Airport Express doesn't have. You'll need to already have a router, though.

 

[Charlie Croker]

Think I might be limited by just Apple TVs though they are good at what they do. Looks like I will have to use an NAS set up. A Synology DS212J with 6TB might fit the bill instead.

 

[DefBref]

You have two problems your trying to solve and I don't think there is a one box solution for you.

Problem 1) You want to centralise your media so its easily accessible by anything on the network. Solution - NAS.

Problem 2) You want to stream your media to TV/Hifi. Solution - ATV/Airport express (express for audio only). However the problem with this is that both devices are designed to interface with itunes, which means in order to access the NAS you will need one of your Macs running itunes constantly (or at least when you want to use the ATV to access your media).

With a newer ipod touch, that supports airplay, you may be able to get round this limitation as I'm sure there will be apps that can directly access the NAS and airplay the media to your ATV.