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Scarpad

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Jan 13, 2005
2,152
655
Ma
Just bought 2 more ATV2's bringing mytotal to 4, Put on in my Kitchen and Bedroom, in addition to my Living Room and Basement HT. Love it in the Kitchen I have all my shows ripped to it and its great not to have to have crap Network TV on while cooking etc. These are great little boxes for the Money.
 
Still only two here so far (LR and BR). Using an Airport Express to stream audio to the kitchen, and my iPad to watch videos and stuff. May add a third if I ever fix up the spare bedroom...

edit:

Will say that if I still had my old town home instead of this condo; I could see having four ATV2's (LR, BR, Den, and spare BR).
 
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How many concurrent TVs will 1 account support on a single machine?

ex. We have a macpro that holds all the media under a single account, how many units will we be able to run?
 
As many as you would like, since Home Sharing does not impose a limit on the number of devices (Apple TV's in this case) that it can link together. Works great!
 
I am considering creating a setup as described but one thing is still not clear to me. If I have one mac mini with a drobo containing all my movies, can I stream a movie to the apple tv2 in the living room while streaming another movie to another apple tv2 in the kitchen?
 
I am considering creating a setup as described but one thing is still not clear to me. If I have one mac mini with a drobo containing all my movies, can I stream a movie to the apple tv2 in the living room while streaming another movie to another apple tv2 in the kitchen?

To date we have been able to watch itunes content on both our ATV's and Plex running on our iMac.

I have 4TB firewire drive connected to my iMac and that is what is feeding iTunes.
 
I have an ATV120GB in my media room attached to a Samsung 40" HDTV and 2 ATV2, one in bedroom 32" Sony HDTV and the other in Dinning-room small 27" all stream off my MacPro.
 
I am considering creating a setup as described but one thing is still not clear to me. If I have one mac mini with a drobo containing all my movies, can I stream a movie to the apple tv2 in the living room while streaming another movie to another apple tv2 in the kitchen?

You should be able to watch the same movie, simultaneously on two different ATVs.
 
You should be able to watch the same movie, simultaneously on two different ATVs.

It doesn't need to be the same movie. The ATVs are pulling content. AirTunes is limited to one 'stream' for N number of devices. Using an AppleTV in the normal way does not have this limitation though.
 
It doesn't need to be the same movie. The ATVs are pulling content. AirTunes is limited to one 'stream' for N number of devices. Using an AppleTV in the normal way does not have this limitation though.

Right. I was just clarifying that you weren't limited to watching different content on different units - and that you can watch the same movie separately on different units if you want to.
 
It doesn't need to be the same movie. The ATVs are pulling content. AirTunes is limited to one 'stream' for N number of devices. Using an AppleTV in the normal way does not have this limitation though.

Right. I was just clarifying that you weren't limited to watching different content on different units - and that you can watch the same movie separately on different units if you want to.

Yes on both counts, and here's another one: :apple:tv2s are not limited to pulling from one source either (this was one of the big steps forward with this model). Each :apple:tv can hit any available iTunes source, simultaneously and/or independently. This works great in households with more than one computer running iTunes at the same time, with libraries customized to that person's tastes. My wife can find her stuff on :apple:tv easily, and I can find mine, just by selecting the desired computer.

EDIT: Just wanted to mention that I picked up a second :apple:tv for the bedroom. When we installed it, my daughter mentioned that she wants one in her room. I'm not so sure about that; we'd possibly never get her out of her room.
 
Thanks for all the replies to my question, that made it more clear for me. Now I have another question. Why would I buy an airport express if I can just buy an ATV2 and hook it up to something like this:
http://www.adorama.com/CBYDVD998.html

Can I now create multiple music zones in the house? Does the Apple remote control app for iphone/ipad have volume control? Does the iphone/ipad app allows you to choose which ATV2 to control? Sorry, lots of questions, I know.
 
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