new external hard drive and Apple Tv not connecting

I have tried for about a month now to be able to have my new external hard drive to work with my apple tv. all I want to do is transfer all movies, music and tv shows from my apple tv to the external so I can save space on my mac mini.

Posted on Nov 26, 2023 12:39 PM

Similar questions

Apple TV not showing Library from MacBook I have a MacBook Pro (2016) running Monterey 12.7.6 and an Apple TV 4K (3rd generation) running tvOS 18.5. Both are connected to the same wi-fi network I want to play my movie/ video files from my MacBook on my Apple TV connected television screen. I have enabled the Home Sharing option in both devices. I copied some videos (MKV, MP4, AVI) files to [Mac OS/Users/<my username>/Movies/TV/Media/Home Videos] I can open the "TV" app on my MacBook and there it shows the files under Library->Home Videos These files can be played in the app on the MacBook However if I now go to my Apple TV and open the "Computers" app I get a screen that simply says "No Libraries Available" How can I see the files that are on the MacBook and play them directly from the Apple TV device? I don't want to play it on my MacBook and then screen share / stream it to the Apple TV.
932 8
Accessing TV media library on AppleTV without MacBookPro running I have an M1 MacBook Pro and an Apple TV 4K. Over the years my TV media library has outgrown any internal drive. Therefore, it resides on an external drive, which is connected to the MBP. That setup works well but when my MBP is not sitting on the desk, it is not connected to the external drive. For years, I have questioned why Apple doesn't allow to connect an external drive to it and make it available over the LAN. What is the best way to access my TV media library without a computer connected to the external drive?
2334 2
TV app videos won't play via Home Sharing I had the TV app set up on a Mac Pro (2013) with the library on an external hard drive "Videos" that I use with the Computers app on my Apple TV via Home Sharing. I have 1,800+ DVDs that I've digitized in that library and a lot of playlists grouping those by actor, director, franchise, theme, etc. I just bought a Mac mini M4 to upgrade my videos server and connected the "Videos" drive to it but when I tried to point the TV app to the "Media" folder on that drive it didn't find anything that it would open. I searched online and saw a comment somewhere that said that it might be caused by the library being too old and that importing the files was the solution. To be safe, I copied the "Media" folder that was on the "Videos" drive to another drive "Backup" before then having the TV app import the files from the "Videos" drive. The result was that the movies were imported but the playlists were not. So I did some more research and saw that the actual "TV Library.tvlibrary" file is usually located in the Movies folder of the user account. I checked my Mac Pro and found that file there. So I deleted the "Media" folder from the "Videos" drive in case the process of importing had changed anything in it and then copied the "Media" folder from the "Backup" drive onto the "Videos" drive. Then I copied the Mac Pro's "TV Library.tvlibrary" file into the Movies directory on the Mac mini and I copied the Mac Pro's "com.apple.TV.plist" file into the Preferences folder on the Mac mini. Opening the TV app on the Mac mini resulted in everything appearing to be fine - all the videos and their thumbnails were there, as were the playlists, and everything also looked fine when I opened the Computers app on my Apple TV. However, when I tried to play one of the videos via the Apple TV it said that the file couldn't be found. I did a Get Info on that video in the TV app on the Mac mini and went to the File tab and the path to the video appeared to be correct. Returning to the Apple TV that video now played correctly. I tried this with more videos via the Apple TV and none work until I check the File tab on the Mac mini. So, there's something happening when I check the File tab that fixes the problem. I have a recollection of the old iTunes app that if it couldn't find a file it would let you navigate to it and then, once found, it would offer to look for other missing files in that same location. I don't see an option like that anywhere in the TV app. Any suggestions on how to best resolve my issue? I love to find something easier than doing a Get Info->File on 1800+ videos. Perhaps there's a way to script that process with Automator but I've only ever attempted to use that once so I'm not confident that I could figure that out.
538 2

2 replies

Urquhart1244

Level 10

150,348 points

Nov 26, 2023 5:06 PM in response to cranston02910

While your Apple TV box doesn’t support external disks,

your Mac does support having its media library (e.g. for the TV app) on an external disk, including for Home Sharing to Apple TV box via the home network.

Please confirm if that is what you wanted.

Nov 26, 2023 2:47 PM in response to cranston02910

You can’t do that.

This thread has been closed by the system or the community team. You may vote for any posts you find helpful, or search the Community for additional answers.

new external hard drive and Apple Tv not connecting

Welcome to Apple Support Community

A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.

Learn more Sign up