Mac mini as music server?

[obsidian1200]

Sounds good! Here's a weird thought. Can I use my iMac monitor for the mini?or will it need it's own monitor? I there such a thing as 'monitor sharing' Didnt hear that term anywhere, just made it up....

You can, assuming you have the 2010 revision of the 27" iMac (I think you do, but the clock speed you gave in a later post doesn't match; assuming a typo?) AND have a non-thunderbolt equipped mini, but rather a mini with a mini displayport. With that combination, you can simply run a mini displayport cable between the two devices and use the Target Display Mode. Only thing with this mode, is you can't get a picture-in-picture effect, so you'll have to work with either the iMac or Mini's desktop.

Or, alternatively, you could boot the mini using a separate display, set it's preferences to allow for screen sharing, and access the screen like that. Depending on your network, that should work just fine, but could possibly be a bit laggy. This option would let you choose from more Mini models as well

 

[wiredup72]

Check out the Qnap or Synology NAS boxes. They run linux and will run iTunes server or Squeezebox server or most other types of servers for you. Plus, you will only be using around 7 watts idle and 15-30 watts when serving (compared to 85 watts continuous for the mini and even more for the iMac) and it frees up your Macs. I have the Qnap 419PII; still not done completely setting it up the way I wan't but I am going to re-rip everything to FLAC.
Good Luck!

 

[Soundhound]

Is this the kind you mean? NAS is all new to me. If I were to go this route, how does it work? How do I control the iTunes? Does it run on my iMac desktop?

Check out the Qnap or Synology NAS boxes. They run linux and will run iTunes server or Squeezebox server or most other types of servers for you. Plus, you will only be using around 7 watts idle and 15-30 watts when serving (compared to 85 watts continuous for the mini and even more for the iMac) and it frees up your Macs. I have the Qnap 419PII; still not done completely setting it up the way I wan't but I am going to re-rip everything to FLAC.
Good Luck!

----------

My iMac is a 27", 2.93 ghz i7. Sorry if I typoed that!

That would be great to be able to connect through the iMac monitor. But I realize my setup may throw another monkey wrench into that solution. I already am using a second monitor. I use it in conjunction with the internal monitor and it 'expands' the desktop. DOn't know if that's the right terminology?
Anyway, I wonder if that cuts me out of being able to use the mini display port in the iMac for a Mac Mini. I'm starting to see the value in Thunderbolt!

You can, assuming you have the 2010 revision of the 27" iMac (I think you do, but the clock speed you gave in a later post doesn't match; assuming a typo?) AND have a non-thunderbolt equipped mini, but rather a mini with a mini displayport. With that combination, you can simply run a mini displayport cable between the two devices and use the Target Display Mode. Only thing with this mode, is you can't get a picture-in-picture effect, so you'll have to work with either the iMac or Mini's desktop.

Or, alternatively, you could boot the mini using a separate display, set it's preferences to allow for screen sharing, and access the screen like that. Depending on your network, that should work just fine, but could possibly be a bit laggy. This option would let you choose from more Mini models as well

 

[mmomega]

My vote would be for a NAS drive.
My Western Digital MyBookWorld 2TB raid NAS has all of the software built into it to be an iTunes sharing drive. You just log into it from any internet browser to it's IP address and enable or disable iTunes sharing. Put your music on the drive and every computer on my network automatically picked up the MyBookWorld in iTunes.
Easy Peasy.

 

[Soundhound]

iTunes over the web?

My vote would be for a NAS drive.
My Western Digital MyBookWorld 2TB raid NAS has all of the software built into it to be an iTunes sharing drive. You just log into it from any internet browser to it's IP address and enable or disable iTunes sharing. Put your music on the drive and every computer on my network automatically picked up the MyBookWorld in iTunes.
Easy Peasy.

 

[philipma1957]

no it is in house or intranet not internet. my nas is from synology called disk station. I have a few hundred tv shows on it. my 4 mac minis all connect to it and can play a movie or a taped show. PLUS I have about 5000 photos and 25000 songs. the lowest cost ones run 150 plus an hdd. a really good one is about 500 plus 2 hdds

 

[Soundhound]

Does iTunes enter into it, or do you access everything from a different program? Im thinking I'd like to keep it all through iTunes.

I guess I need to read up on this. What should I be researching? Network drives w/iTunes library?

no it is in house or intranet not internet. my has is from synology called disk station. I have a few hundred tv shows on it. my 4 mac minis all connect to it and can play a movie or a taped show. PLUS I have about 5000 photos and 25000 songs. the lowest cost ones run 150 plus an hdd. a really good one is about 500 plus 2 hdds

 

[philipma1957]

i use iTunes for music eyetv for tv recording and watching. some use plex for movies

 

[mmomega]

iTunes over the web?

No, iTunes on my network.
Shows up automatically as a shared music drive inside iTunes.


This was just the option I used.
Read more about it http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=280
Mid page click the horizontal Grey bar that says more features>

 

[Soundhound]

That looks great! So each mac and iOS device accesses the drive independently, through the wifi network, directly to the MyBook Live?I think that's what I'm looking for.

Seems simpler than this solution which I was just reading about:

http://www.macworld.com/article/163242/2011/11/organize_and_play_your_media_from_a_nas.html

No, iTunes on my network.
Shows up automatically as a shared music drive inside iTunes.


This was just the option I used.
Read more about it http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=280
Mid page click the horizontal Grey bar that says more features>

 

[mmomega]

That looks great! So each mac and iOS device accesses the drive independently, through the wifi network, directly to the MyBook Live?I think that's what I'm looking for.

Seems simpler than this solution which I was just reading about:

http://www.macworld.com/article/163242/2011/11/organize_and_play_your_media_from_a_nas.html

I completely understand what you were going for and I went that route myself by buying a Mac Mini to run Plex on my TV as well as host music, etc.

I already had an AppleTV2g which I now run Plex on and I already had the MyBook NAS as a storage drive. I just wised up and used the equipment I had and use the Mini for another purpose.

 

[Soundhound]

Thank you for all the info, I'm going to read up more on all this. Really appreciate it!

Btw are you able to keep the iTunes library up to date with music bought on any and all of the OSX and IOs devices?

I completely understand what you were going for and I went that route myself by buying a Mac Mini to run Plex on my TV as well as host music, etc.

I already had an AppleTV2g which I now run Plex on and I already had the MyBook NAS as a storage drive. I just wised up and used the equipment I had and use the Mini for another purpose.

 

[wiredup72]

Is this the kind you mean? NAS is all new to me. If I were to go this route, how does it work? How do I control the iTunes? Does it run on my iMac desktop?

http://www.qnap.com/USEng/pro_detail_feature.asp?p_id=212

This is what I have. Check out the description and the diagrams and you will understand better. The iTunes library resides on the NAS and your different apple products have access to it wirelessly (or wired, or through your own internet cloud) by using the NAS' iTunes server, or other server if you wish.

Info on the iTunes server: http://www.qnap.com/pro_features_iTunes.asp

 

[Adamantoise]

Thank you for all the info, I'm going to read up more on all this. Really appreciate it!

Btw are you able to keep the iTunes library up to date with music bought on any and all of the OSX and IOs devices?

See it as one hard drive that all computers have access to. So if you change anything on it, then it changes across all your computers.

You only have one iTunes library to manage this way.

 

[Soundhound]

Gotcha. This will work perfectly. What about when you buy music at the itunes store on one of the devices? It gets copied to my main itunes library when any device joined the network, (while connected to ac power, I think). Will that work when the itunes library is on an NAS drive? Should, right? Also I guess in the future (when I go to iCloud) this won't really be an issue?

See it as one hard drive that all computers have access to. So if you change anything on it, then it changes across all your computers.

You only have one iTunes library to manage this way.

 

[Adamantoise]

Gotcha. This will work perfectly. What about when you buy music at the itunes store on one of the devices? It gets copied to my main itunes library when any device joined the network, (while connected to ac power, I think). Will that work when the itunes library is on an NAS drive? Should, right? Also I guess in the future (when I go to iCloud) this won't really be an issue?

iTunes is not tied to a computer, but rather an iTunes account.

Your iTunes library is basically a folder located on a hard drive. Now this hard drive can be any drive, even a network drive, as long as the computer you're currently using has access to it.

So let's say you buy music on your iMac in your living room, then buy music on your Macbook Pro while using the bathroom, iTunes will download the music to the same folder on the network drive (as long as you used the same Apple ID and both computers have their iTunes library pointed to that network drive)

In fact, let's say you don't like a song anymore and want to remove it from your library ... If you remove it on your iMac, next time you open iTunes on your Macbook Pro, the song will be gone from there too.

It's like all your computers share the same iTunes library and hard drive.

Now the Mini can do this too, but it's more expensive, and you'll have to leave it on constantly to have access to it.

 

[Le Big Mac]

The issue is room really. I'm trying to keep things as organized and spare as possible in my work space.

You really need a monitor only once to set it up, and perhaps occasionally after that. Once you have it set up, use Screen Sharing to control the mini from your other Mac in order to do admin tasks and such.

 

[wiredup72]

You really need a monitor only once to set it up, and perhaps occasionally after that. Once you have it set up, use Screen Sharing to control the mini from your other Mac in order to do admin tasks and such.

Good point.

Although, I still the mini as a too expensive option with too limited hard drive space and no redundancy and fewer options. Plus with a NAS you don't need a monitor, keyboard or mouse ever. You just access it with whatever computer you have via your web browser.

Although, I will add that the mini will be setup a lot faster for someone use to Mac only. QNAP or Synology (I don't know much about the WD NAS options) will have a slight learning curve if you want to do things like establish a RAID or use it as a cloud server. But they do have less expensive single bay versions that can be had for around $150 and the price of a hard drive. Way more flexibility for a third of the price of a Mini if you go that route. Very clean, lean and low powered.

 

[Soundhound]

I'm liking the NAS approach a lot, looking at the western digital my book live. On OsX devices, my iMacs and MacBook pros, will I be able to treat the mp3s as I do now on my main imac which is serving upiTunes on an attached external hd?, meaning will I be able to drag and drop tunes into the iTunes library on the NAS, and copy them off to the local hds etc?