iTunes library on external hard drive?

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Level 1

59 points

iTunes library on external hard drive?

I have a newer Apple TV that I like to use to play iTunes music on the living room wannabe home theater. But, since all my music is stored on my PC, I need to have my PC running all the time, which is in another room in the house and kind of inconvenient to go turn it on every time I want to hear my music.

I also have the Airport N router. Is there a way to get an external drive (Either USB plugged into the router, or one of those wireless network hard drives) and then have all of my music stored on that, instead of my PC? So if I want to listen to music on my PC, it will stream from the new drive.. and have my Apple TV will stream from that too instead of my PC? And also have my iPod sync up with it too when I plug it into my PC to recharge?

I'm sure I can have all my music on any drive and just specify that for the library in iTunes as where it saves my music, but what I really want to do is have my library running off of this external drive, so that all of my devices can just connect to that, instead of having to connect to iTunes on my PC first. I guess kinda like a Cloud kind of thing, only it's just on my local home wireless network.

So is this possible? If so, how?

G5, Mac OS X (10.2.x)

Posted on Feb 16, 2011 12:19 PM

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Answer 1

Feb 16, 2011 2:37 PM in response to Tim Kline

Even if you move all of your music to a networked drive, which you can do, you will still have to have you computer running in order to play the music through your Apple TV. The new Apple TV has no storage space of its own and neither ATV could access an external drive. You need iTunes running for that.

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Answer 2

Chris CA

Level 10

82,434 points

Feb 16, 2011 2:50 PM in response to Tim Kline

I need to have my PC running all the time, which is in another room in the house and kind of inconvenient to go turn it on every time I want to hear my music.

If it's running all the time, there's no need to go turn it on every time.

so that all of my devices can just connect to that, instead of having to connect to iTunes on my PC first

They need iTunes.

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Answer 3

Tim Kline Author

Level 1

59 points

Feb 17, 2011 8:35 AM in response to Tim Kline

OK, thanks. That's what I was afraid of.

I don't like keeping my PC running when I don't need it. In fact I've been wanting to get rid of it and eventually just get a macbook air or something like that. So that's why I was thinking it would be great if I could just have my own little file server kind of thing going with an external hard drive plugged into my router. But then, if I did that, my Apple TV would then have to connect through my laptop? I don't like that idea either. Oh well.

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